The Long Road
by cartographer
Summary: Marian is captured by Templars when she's eight. She knows her father is a wanted apostate, so she gives her mother's name - Amell. The story of Marian Amell-Hawke's journey through both games. (f!Amell-f!Hawke)/Alistair/Fenris
1. The Sacrifice

Marian is eight when the templars catch up with her. It's her own fault, she knows. She isn't supposed to go to the market alone – isn't supposed to show off – isn't supposed to talk to the village children – but she can't help it; one of them is so infuriating that she throws a rock, and then a little spurt of flame comes out of her hand.

For a moment she's ecstatic. She's never made as much fire as that, and she can't wait to run home and tell her father all about it.

Then she remembers where she is, and who is watching her, and what she has very explicitly promised never to do in front of strangers. The other children are staring at her in horror, but the boy she'd thrown a rock at is halfway across the square, shouting for his mother. Adults bring the templars, she knows, and it is all her fault, she'll be caught and her father will be caught and fettered and it is all her fault –

Quicker than thought she is running toward their distant farmhouse, praying to the Maker with all her heart that Carver and Bethany are still playing at the old stump that marks their property line.

She sends the twins scrambling with two words and then stops, watching them go. She knows what she has to do; it is not a new idea, but one born of sleepless nights after her father explained the realities of their life after her first, glorious burst of magic. He has always treated her like an adult. Now she has to act like one.

Marian looks down at her feet, at where the twins were playing. Bethany's marbles and Carver's stuffed toy horse are lying there, abandoned in their mad rush, and on impulse she scoops them up. The pouch of marbles goes around her neck if she ties the strings just right, and she clutches the horse as she flees back to the village square. She hasn't been gone long, but she can see some of the villagers whispering as they see her pass. Rumors are already spreading about her, and probably her family.

She reaches the spot where the children were playing. It's not far to the local chantry, and she needs to be ready when the templars come.

She misses her family already. Marian cannot conceive of a life in which she will never see her mother's face again, or smell the scent of her hair; she already misses the way her father presses her hand when she is upset, and Carver's way of cuddling into any hug he gives. She will never tell secrets with Bethany under the covers again.

She will need a story to tell the templars when they arrive. Marian is not sure what they will be inclined to believe, but she has covered for the twins enough that she knows how to lie. Simpler is better, she decides, squatting in the dirt and carefully tucking Carver's horse into her belt before covering her hands in it. She rubs at her face and knees and elbows, then dusts off her hands on her dress and finds a convenient box to sit on.

She will not have to wait very long, after all.

Marian has heard stories of the templars since the day she first sparked her first spell. In her imagination they are ten feet tall, with swords of fire and ice and shadows that live beneath their helms, ready to suck the magic out of misbehaving mages.

The templar that comes to fetch her is much less impressive. He looks like a normal man, she decides after studying him for a long minute. He could be the baker, or someone's father. He looks like he has dirt under his nails. He talks to the boy's mother for a moment, and then the boy, who points straight at her.

She still doesn't like him. Tattletale.

The templar comes over to her, walking slowly, and Marian reminds herself of the story she plans to tell. His armor makes clashing noises, fighting itself, as he stops in front of her.

"You have been accused of performing magic," he says to her, and his eyes are not unkind. The templar looks tired, like her father after too much magic, and despite herself she starts to like this templar.

"I didn't mean to," Marian says in a small, unsteady voice. "I'm not a mage."

"You are a mage," he says, squatting in front of her. "A mage is someone who can do magic."

"I don't want to be a mage," she says, and in that moment it's the truth. If she weren't a mage, she would be at home right now, helping her mother with dinner. She yearns to be there in that moment so badly that she starts to cry without quite meaning to.

There is pity in his eyes now. "I'm afraid you don't have a choice in the matter," he says, and stands again, glancing around the square. "Where are your parents?"

"I told them what happened," she gets out around her tears. "Mama said – " This is harder than she expected; her mother would never say such things. "She said I was unnatural, and I wasn't ever to come back, and they got in the wagon – " She chokes on another sob, and gratefully takes the opportunity to stop.

The templar's eyes go all flat and tired behind his helm. "Maker," he sighs. "Maybe it's for the best, child. You're for the Circle, in any case."

"Yes, ser." She bites her lip and looks down at her hands. She's not afraid of the Circle, not like she is of the templars, but it's not home. Nothing will ever be right, ever again.

"What's your name, child?"

She looks up at him. "Marian, ser. Marian Amell." Her father was in the Circle before escaping. She knows she cannot use her real last name unless she wants the templars to hunt her family – and that is exactly what she doesn't want.

She accepts the hand that he offers, her hand tiny in his massive armored fist, and he takes her to the chantry for the night. The sisters fuss a little over her dirt-stained knees and elbows and she gets a bath before she's put to bed.

The next morning, the Revered Mother blesses her before breakfast. Her templar, Ser Danneel, is to escort her to the nearest city, where they will meet up with another templar to take her the rest of the way to the Circle.

Marian has spent a miserable night in an unfamiliar bed, with initiates who will not so much as look at her and talk about her as if she's not in the room with them. They call her 'little mage' and she learns that her tiny flame has been exaggerated into a fireball by nervous villagers and malicious gossip. She snorts; it had been barely a handspan high and slightly hotter than the sun on a warm summer's day. Marian sighs. Is this to be her life? She presses her hand against the pouch of marbles under the neck of her dress, and feels the warm pressure of Carver's horse tucked into her belt. Ser Danneel had almost certainly noticed the horse, but had allowed her to keep it. She could hope that all templars would be so understanding, but hope had no place in the real world. She will have to think of some way to hide them.

She gets her wish when it is time to leave. The sisters present her with a rough bag made of straw sacking; inside are a change of clothes, several smallclothes, and a rough wooden doll, well burnished by someone's thumbs. "Thank you," she says to the sisters, so grateful for this small act of kindness that she will start to cry if she does nothing.

Then they leave, and Marian cannot help the last look she gives over her shoulder at their distant farmhouse. Goodbye, she tells it silently.


	2. The Circle

They approach the tower of the Circle from the north. They'd left the North Road behind two days ago, plodding along on horses that are no more in a hurry to go southward toward the cold than she is, but Marian's been able to see the spear of the tower in the distance for hours. She doesn't know what to expect, so she can't prepare, and the templars are close-mouthed about what happens when they get there. She thinks Ser Danneel would tell her more, but Ser Jadic is terse and distant. She has more than one bruise from his careless handling.

On her right, Lake Calenhad stretches out into the distance. She's never seen anything so big, or so beautiful. She wants to run down to the shore and take off her shoes to go wading. She wants to push Carver into the surf. She wants…

She wants many things. Marian rubs at her eyes angrily.

"We're almost there," Ser Danneel tells her. He is very large behind her on the horse, and she has to tip her head back to look him in the eyes. "We have to take a boat across part of the lake."

She has never been on a boat before. The idea occupies her for all of three minutes, but the reality is far different from her imaginings; the man with the oars smells like fermented fish, and there is an appalling odor coming from down the shore. The boat rocks nearly sideways sometimes, with no rhyme or reason that she can tell, and Marian feels that she's going to be ill at any moment.

"If you're going to sick up, do it over the other side, for pity's sake," the ferryman grunts without looking at her.

For all that she hates the trip, the view is incredible. The lake stretches far, far into the distance, speckled with white in places where the wind is whipping the water into froth. Marian pinches her nose and stares into the distance, wishing herself far away from this place, free to fly as she pleases with the birds.

They dock on the island and Ser Jadic stays in the boat with the boatsman while Ser Danneel takes her into the tower. The tower doors are large, dark, and forbidding, but they open just like any other doors, and Marian takes a deep breath and walks through them.

Ser Danneel presses on her shoulder, a silent command to stay where she is, and steps forward, coming to attention. "Knight-Commander Greagoir, ser," he says to the silent figure standing in the entrance hall. Knight-Commander Greagoir is not wearing a helm, and his face is stern in the pale morning light. "I'm Danneel, ser, out of Byerley, east of Highever."

"Greetings," Greagoir says, and then he looks at Marian. "Is this a mage child?" His gaze is cold, and she doesn't breathe until he looks away, back to Ser Danneel.

"She sparked in the middle of market day," Ser Danneel says, weary amusement in his voice. "The old biddies raced each other to report her."

"And her family?"

"Left her," he says, and this time there is no amusement at all in his voice. Marian knows enough of Danneel to know that he is angry on her behalf now, angry at the people she has made up out of whole cloth. She can't help the guilty feeling that spreads down her chest and sinks into her stomach. She owes him nothing, she knows, but she still feels as if she is stealing his kindness and concern.

"Perhaps for the best, then," Greagoir says, echoing Danneel in the market square. "Did you question the villagers?"

"Yes, ser. There's no family in the township missing a child her age; I've sent a notice to the next two towns east and west on the North Road, but the child says they're traveling folk."

Greagoir sighs. "If you can locate them, well and good, but you're not likely to find a traveler who doesn't want to be found."

Ser Danneel turns and motions at Marian, who hesitates before moving to stand beside him. She grips the small sack with all her worldly goods in her hand.

"This is Marian Amell," Ser Danneel says to Greagoir before looking down at her. "Marian, this is Knight-Commander Greagoir."

"Good morning, Knight-Commander," Marian says automatically. She's struck with a sudden memory of Mama going over and over proper greetings until she wanted to scream. You're an Amell, Mama was fond of saying. Act like one.

Greagoir's eyes thaw a little bit, and he unbends enough to incline his head in her general direction. "Greetings," he says. "Welcome to the Circle."

And that is that. Ser Danneel disappears, somehow, before Marian can say goodbye to the last person she knows, and she is whisked up to the head mage in charge of the Circle. He takes one look at her and snaps an order, and she's pressed down into a chair and offered tea and a slightly aged scone.

"My dear," he says – she didn't catch his name, and is now too shy and her mouth is too full to ask again – "You must be exhausted."

Marian nods. She's not actually that tired since it's not yet noon, but she is mentally exhausted, and close to tears again. She has been leaning on Ser Danneel all unknowing since they left Byerley, and now that he is gone she misses everyone, even the stupid boy she threw a rock at. She would give anything for this to be one hideously bad dream.

"Child, what is your name?" the mage behind the desk asks.

"Marian Amell, ser," she says, hastily swallowing her last bite of scone. She washes it down with her tea and sets the cup and saucer down on the edge of his desk, for a lack of anywhere else to put it.

"Amell is not a Ferelden name," he says, tapping his finger against his mouth thoughtfully.

"It's my name, and I'm Fereldan," she says, confused.

He smiles. "Of course. I apologize." She can see in his face that he doesn't believe her, but he doesn't say anything else, only sits there with a half-smile on his face.

Marian swallows. "I didn't hear you when you said your name, ser," she says.

"I am First Enchanter Irving, child," he says, sitting forward in his chair. "You understand what's happening, yes? You know you're to live here now?"

"Yes, ser," she whispers. Marian battles tears for what feels like the millionth time in the last week. She is tired of crying.

Irving sighs. "I know you're upset, child. We have all been through what you're going through right now. Each of us are taken from our families when our magic first erupts, and are brought here for training. I'm very sorry, but this is the way it must be."

Her father has spoken of this before, but she didn't understand all of it. He told her once that she would understand more as she grew older, but that doesn't make any sense to her – grownups don't act any smarter than she is, but she trusts her father. This is something to do with that, and Irving seems to expect something, so she nods. Irving rewards her with a smile, gestures with one hand, and another mage instantly comes through the door. Marian stares; she's never seen magic used so casually, so openly.

Irving winks at her as he addresses the other mage. "Torvay, this is Marian. She's a new apprentice; would you see that she finds a bed in the apprentice quarters and then ask Cassandra to provide her anything she might need?"

"Of course, First Enchanter," Torvay says, bowing. She is much younger than Irving, and her mage robes are new and stiff, crackling when she moves. She holds her hand out for Marian's, and after a glance at Irving Marian takes it, hastily grabbing her sack with her other hand.

The ghost of her mother urges her to thank the First Enchanter, Marian, think of your manners, but she will not thank the people who have taken her from her family. She will never thank them for anything.

Torvay leads her to the door. "Welcome to the Circle, Marian," Irving says from behind her. She doesn't turn.


	3. The Harrowing

From this point on, there will be game dialogue.

* * *

Marian is shaken awake roughly in the middle of the night. It feels like she's just gone to sleep; her mouth tastes disgusting and her eyes are grainy and dry with what feels like the entire library's worth of dust.

She's going to kill Petra if this is another one of her _emergencies_.

When she opens her eyes, the faceless Templar mask is leaning over her, one armored finger to his lips. She knows the tales – apprentices taken in the middle of the night and never seen from again, or turned Tranquil, or laid up in the infirmary, silent and damaged.

She is so scared that she can't breathe.

"Get dressed, apprentice," the templar says, quiet in order not to wake the entire apprentice dorm. His voice is colorless, neutral. Maybe it's not as bad as it could be.

The templar retreats and turns his back while Marian dresses quickly, her fingers trembling. She taps him on the shoulder when she's done and he points at the door, gesturing for her to precede him. He's surprisingly quiet, even in his plate; it's like being followed by an angry ghost. He escorts her up to the fifth floor, higher than she's ever been before.

Irving and Greagoir are waiting for her, and Marian cannot help the quick flare of relief that comes when she sees Irving. She doesn't trust him – she doesn't trust anyone in this place, but at least it's not the worst that she feared. Cullen is here, too, and despite herself she relaxes a little bit more.

It's a large, open chamber, with magic etched into the floor and the pillars scattered around the room. There's a font in the center, glowing with the wavering blue light of processed lyrium.

Greagoir starts to speak, and she snaps her attention back to him. "'_Magic exists to serve man and never to rule over him._' Thus spoke the prophet Andraste as she cast down the Tevinter Imperium, ruled by mages who had brought the world to the edge of ruin. Your magic is a gift, but it's also a curse, for demons of the dream realm - the Fade - are drawn to you and seek to use you as a gateway into this world."

The basic catechism of the Chantry is something she's heard every day since she came to live at the Circle. She believes, although she's not devout, but something in the mindless grind that is the templars' indoctrination of the evil mages makes her want to do the craziest things. Anders would be proud of her.

Marian prefers her father's litany: _My magic will serve that which is best in me, not that which is most base_. She remembers so little of her family, but that remains; that and the way his hand engulfed hers, how his whiskers scratched in the morning, and their faces, always their faces. It's been ten years, but she has managed to hold on to at least that.

Irving's voice startles her from her thoughts. "This is why the Harrowing exists," he says, moving between her and Greagoir. "The ritual sends you into the Fade, and there you will face a demon, armed with only your will."

The surge of relief leaves her a little breathless. It's the Harrowing. Of course it's the Harrowing. She feels foolishly paranoid to have thought otherwise, but something in the depths of her mind tells her that if she'd rather face a demon on its own turf with no weapons than... the other things she'd been worrying about, if that was an appropriate reaction to the situation, then the situation was far worse than she realized.

Marian puts that thought aside for another time. "I am ready," she tells Irving. _Maker, please let me be ready_.

Greagoir speaks before Irving can. "Know this, apprentice: if you fail, we templars will perform our duty. You will die."

Cullen flinches, which only draws attention to the fact that he's not wearing his helm. She doesn't know what either of those facts mean, so she puts them away to puzzle over later, because Greagoir is speaking again.

"This is lyrium," Greagoir says, "the very essence of magic and your gateway into the Fade."

Irving speaks from her other side; they're closing her in. _Maybe they've had problems with apprentices attempting to flee in the past_, Marian thinks with inappropriate levity. In any case, it forces her to keep turning between them. "The Harrowing is a secret out of necessity, child. Every mage must go through this trial by fire. As we succeeded, so shall you. Keep your wits about you and remember the Fade is a realm of dreams. The spirits may rule it, but your own will is real."

At least _someone_ is confident in her abilities.

"The apprentice must go through this test alone, First Enchanter." Marian can practically hear the frown in his voice, though she doesn't turn around to see it; she's familiar with all his scowls.

The lyrium font is distractingly bright. Greagoir says something she's not interested in listening to; she hopes it's permission to proceed, because she's already reaching for the pool of light that sings to the magic in her blood...

There's a blinding flash of light; Marian instinctively blocks her eyes with her hand and everything goes dark.

When the light comes back and her eyes clear, she's in the Fade. There's only one path, framed by twisted approximations of trees, so she takes it. The first wisp unnerves her, but she destroys a few of them before she's stopped by a small mouse in her path.

_Huh_, she thinks. _That's odd_. And then it speaks to her.

"Someone else thrown to the wolves. As fresh and unprepared as ever. It isn't right that they do this, the templars. Not to you, me, anyone."

Marian frowns. "As touched as I am by your concern, I'm not sure I understand why the Templars would send a rat into the Fade." She makes a face. "A _talking_ rat."

The rat snorts. "You look like that because you _think_ you do." It – he? – sighs. "It's always the same. But it's not your fault. You're in the same boat I was, aren't you?" With that, the rat stretches in a direction that doesn't exist. It grows upward, faster than her eye can follow, and suddenly there is a man shape where before there was nothing. The man's outline wobbles slightly and Marian swallows, suddenly nauseous, before his shape solidifies into a man only a little older than she is. "Allow me to welcome you to the Fade," he says, spreading his arms slightly to include his surroundings. "You can call me... well, Mouse."

Marian raises an eyebrow. "Not your real name, I take it?" she says, crossing her arms. Her mind is frantically taking notes in the hope of working out how to replicate it in the real world. _Didn't Elgion's Magical Laws mention shapeshifting?_

"No. I don't remember anything from... before. The templars kill you if you take too long, you see. They figure you failed, and they don't want something getting out." Marian feels another pang of terror. He smiles faintly, though there is no amusement in his voice. "That's what they did to me, I think. I have no body to reclaim. And you don't have much time before you end up the same."

"How long do I have?" she asks, urgency quickening her voice.

"I don't remember, exactly. I..." He looks away. "I ran away and I hid."

She's known apprentices like this, who are perfectly competent when someone is there to hold their hand but can't take even the least step on their own. Kendrick had been like that, before the Templars took him away. No one ever saw him again. Against her will, she can feel herself softening toward the rat. If he'd been an apprentice, just like her, just like Kendrick... well, it's hard to hold things against someone who's in the same situation she is. Or worse.

"What must I do?" she asks.

Mouse steps a little closer and speaks a little faster. "There's something here, contained, just for an apprentice like you. You have to face the creature, a demon, and resist it, if you can. That's your way out."

That's it, then. Resist a demon, in an unspecified time frame, or die.

She wonders if she'll even notice when her body ceases to exist.

Marian covers her face in her hands, hiding her thoughts from the rat as she takes several deep, quiet breaths to quiet her mind. When she feels calm again, she drops her hands and nods firmly. "All right. Whatever I have to do, I'll do it."

"There are others here, other spirits. They will tell you more, maybe help... if you can believe anything you see," Mouse says, a fevered sort of encouragement in his voice. "I'll follow, if that's all right. My chance was long ago, but you... you may have a way out." With that, he performs the same mind-bending twist as he did before and shrinks back into a rat.

_I could do without the flashing lights_, she thinks, swallowing hard against the nausea. "Is there anything I could do to stop you?" she asks the rat, eyes narrowed, then sighs. "Never mind, that was a rhetorical question." _And terrible of me_, she adds mentally with a wince. Mouse is just a poor, pathetic sod who's been trapped in the Fade for aeons. It isn't his fault that he puts her back up for no reason she can understand.

She starts down the path again, Mouse scurrying at her heels. The Fade is a strange, eerie place, made of colors that don't seem to exist in the real world... or maybe it's just that everything seems to be covered in a bile-yellow film. The ground is dry and cracked with short, scrubby grass in patches, desperate for a rain that will never come, and her feet slip a little when she walks. Everything here is abandoned or dead. The person whose dream this is desperately needs a little fun in their life.

Marian refuses to think about the possibility that it might be her own.

She rounds the corner and finds a sort of clearing to the right of the path, ringed with more of those not-trees and a ravine in the back. "That is where the test will take place," Mouse informs her. She supposes his new-found willingness to please is what she deserves for threatening to leave him, but she still doesn't like it. "The creature can be anywhere, but it manifests there."

"Thank you, Mouse," she says gently, but he does not answer. In her guilt she realizes that she's already half-determined to find a way to release him from his living hell, although she doesn't have any idea of how to go about it. A thought for another time, she tells herself as she gives the clearing a wide berth and continues down the path. The list of things she's promised herself to think about later is longer than she likes to let it get, but she has had no opportunity to pare it down. Maybe later.

Mouse has been up front with answers so far, she thinks. Hopefully he'll have a few more for her. "Mouse, how am I to defeat a demon? I've never even seen one."

Mouse is silent for so long that she thinks he's refusing to answer her, but eventually he speaks. "I don't remember, but... You fight it, I think. You kill it."

_Helpful_, she thinks, then sighs. "Is that it?"

Mouse's voice, when it comes, is thoughtful. "Well, think of it this way: Everything here is a matter of will, right? I'm not really a mouse, just like you're not really standing there in that body. You fight the creature, you're resisting it. If it wins, it defeats you and possesses you."

Marian frowns. "And if I win?"

Her only answer is a startled glance, one that changes even as she watches into wary recognition. He seems to be looking past her. "Another spirit that way. It never seemed equal to its name, to me."

She turns to look over her shoulder and sees something bright and shining that way. "It won't kill and eat me, will it?"

Mouse snorts. "Not unless you're very bad."

He looks like he's just as startled as she is at his first signs of humor, so she passes on calling him on it and walks up to the spirit.

Valor is as good as his name, and she quickly agrees to his duel; it is not so high a price to pay, after all, and it is all her own. When he is despatched he offers her a staff that she takes gladly. It is a fine staff and will serve her well, at least until she leaves the Fade.

Marian feels more powerful after that, with the staff in her hand and her first real fight behind her. She owes both of these things to Valor, whose nature does in fact reflects his name. Nothing in the Tower has prepared her for the idea that benevolent spirits roam the Fade alongside the demons. The Chant makes no mention of any such spirits; it's hard to say whether they don't know about it or whether it's been left out of the Tower's version.

Marian is willing to bet on the latter. The Tower chantry only seems interested in teaching mages the lessons it thinks they need to learn, in keeping mages in their rightful place, in helping the templars to keep their boots on mages' necks.

She presses on, looking for the boundaries of this little corner of the Fade, and Mouse warns her again before they run into another spirit.

"This one is not the one hunting you," he says, his voice unusually diffident. "But still... "

The spirit looks like a large bear. A large, sleeping bear, twisted and corrupted. Marian frowns.

"Should we come back later?" Marian asks, for lack of anything else. Well, she supposes she could walk up and poke it with her staff, but that seems... unwise, although she does unlimber her staff from its bindings on her back. Just in case.

The bear shifts a little in its sleep, then speaks, without ever opening its eyes. "So you're the mortal being hunted? I see you brought snacks. How polite."

She hears a faint squelching noise next to her and hastily averts her eyes. When he's more or less human, Mouse says, "I don't like this. I don't think he's in a helpful mood."

"I don't need helpful," Marian says, narrowing her eyes. "I just need some answers."

"Answers?" the bear murmurs, almost purring. "The demon will get you eventually. Perhaps it'll leave me a few scraps. What need of answers will you have then?"

Marian makes a snap decision that will almost certainly come back to haunt her. "No," she says, stowing her staff on her back. "I don't know what your game is, and I'm not going to play it." She turns her back on the bear and starts down the path to the demon clearing. She hears a slight rustling behind her and then Mouse is hurrying to keep up.

"Was that wise?" Mouse asks, breathless.

"Probably not," she says. "But I am in no mood – and I have no time – for prying answers from a demon."

Mouse lapses back into a sulky sort of silence, and Marian ignores him in turn. There is nothing else for it; it's time to seek out the demon.

_My magic will serve that which is best in me, not that which is most base._

_Don't die._

Mouse keeps quiet on the way back to the clearing – Valor salutes her as they go by, which gives her a startled moment – but when they approach the lip of the raised area around it, Mouse asks, "Are you ready?"

"Ready as I'll ever be," Marian answers, and she walks into the arena.

To her shock, the demon and its wisp minions are _easy_. The wisps hurt her very little, so she ignores them and concentrates all her damage on the demon, which goes down screaming when her cold spell finishes it off. The wisps disappear with the demon, and she hovers awkwardly with staff in hand while thinking, _Was that it?_

She can hear Mouse transforming behind her, the coward. "You did it. You actually did it! When you came, I hoped that maybe you might be able to... but I never really thought any of you were worthy."

"It's all a little too easy," Marian says, scanning the clearing warily.

"That is because you are a true mage, one of the few. The others, they never had a chance. The templars set them up to fail, like they tried with you. I regret my part in it, but you have shown me that there is hope. You can be so much more than you know," Mouse says, eager, his words coming faster until he's tripping over his own tongue.

Marian still feels like something's wrong. She just can't figure out what; she searches the area and her mind while she says something or other to Mouse. She's not really paying attention.

It takes her a ridiculously long time to understand what her mind is trying to tell her. If her test is completed, then why isn't she waking up?

"... maybe there's hope in that for someone as small and as... forgotten as me," Mouse is saying when she spins to question him. "If you want to help. There may be a way for me to leave here, to get a foothold outside." Marian listens, a growing horror keeping her from saying anything. "You just need to want to let me in."

"To let you in," she repeats dully. No matter where the emphasis lies in that sentence, it keeps getting worse: to _let_ him in; to let _him_ in; to let him _in_... in where? "That wasn't my test, was it."

Mouse frowns. "What? What are you... Of course it was!" He moves closer, trying to catch her eye. Marian steps well back and away from him, keeping her eyes averted; suddenly everything she knows about demons is terrifyingly small. Can he possess her through her eyes? Does she have to consent, or will even the slightest softening of her will suffice?

There is one way she can avoid possession, she knows, and her hand tightens on her staff. She will do what she has to do. She will live.

Mouse laughs suddenly, and she can't help but look at him. "You are a smart one," he says, a smirk on his face. It looks out of place for the man she had assumed him to be. So too does his voice, dropping whole octaves in seconds until it's something that could never come from a human's throat. "Simple killing is a warrior's job. The real dangers of the fade are preconceptions, careless trust... " Mouse's body begins to twist in the direction Marian has begun to become accustomed to, and she starts to look away, but when he twists _up_ instead of in she pauses, her attention caught. He grows, and grows, and she backs away in horror as she sees exactly what she's been traveling with. "..._pride_."

And then she knows no more.


	4. The Templar

"Marian? Are you all right?"

This time it's day when she wakes, fuzzy from a long night and use of magic. She knows it's Jowan – she recognizes his voice – but Marian doesn't want to go through the unofficial side of the Harrowing, the ritual hazing by the apprentices the day after some lucky sod finally earns their Circle robes. She's been one of those apprentices, and she knows where they're coming from, but she groans as she realizes what she's probably going to be enduring today. Questions. All the questions in the world.

_Great_.

"Say something, please?"

Jowan sounds honestly worried this time, and Marian sighs. "I'm fine, Jowan. You do realize you're interrupting my beauty sleep?"

A sly note creeps into his voice. "As if you need it," he says, and she laughs and opens her eyes. He grins at her, and she grins back. Jowan's been a good friend since she was brought to the Tower. He lifts her feet and sits on the end of her bed, letting her rest her feet in his lap. "I'm glad you're all right," Jowan says quietly. "They carried you in this morning. I didn't even realize you'd been gone _all night_." He sounds stricken.

"It's all right," Marian says, propping herself up on one elbow so she can see his face. Jowan's been having mood swings in the past few months. She's not sure of the cause, but she can usually prod him out of them. She frowns. "Wait, does that mean you weren't in bed last night either?"

Jowan flushes a dark, brick red from his cheekbones down, and she laughs. "_Oh_," she says. "Who is he?" She sits fully upright, struck by a sudden thought. "Oh Maker, tell me it's not Anders."

"What – no!" Jowan sputters, his hands tightening on her ankle. She kicks at him a little and he scowls at her, his black hair giving him the look of a thundercloud about to burst. "It's nothing like that. I'll tell you later."

"So long as it's not Anders," Marian repeats, dropping back onto her pillow. "Angharad cried for _weeks_, do you remember? And Lissette – ow!"

Jowan rubbed her foot where he'd pinched it, scowling. "Don't you ever stop talking?"

"You'd better start," she says, unrepentant. "What's got you in such a snit?"

"What was it like?" Jowan asks quietly.

Marian pulls her feet out of Jowan's lap and stands. "Jowan, I love you, but you know I can't tell you anything. It's a _secret_." For something to do, she takes her hair down from its bun and runs her fingers through it to loosen it.

"So much for friendship," he says angrily. "We're not all as talented as you. _Irving's pet_," he says, making the words a curse. Marian spins on him, suddenly furious. She's heard the nickname eavesdropping on the other apprentices, but for her best friend to say that to her face – only to find him looking at his hands, forlorn. "I don't know when they'll call me for my Harrowing," he says. "_If_ they'll call me."

Impulsively, she leans forward and takes his hands in hers. "They'll summon you when you're ready," she says gently, and it's hard to avoid the thought that he's not ready yet. There's some truth in the teacher's pet namecalling, terrible as it is to think those thoughts; Irving gives her private instruction sometimes, and she is a more gifted student than Jowan.

"I've been here longer than you have..." he says. "Sometimes I think they just don't want to test me."

Marian can see the storm cloud beginning to form in the creases between his eyes. Of all things she doesn't want to deal with Jowan in a _mood_ – not today, of all days. Letting go of his hands, she stands and picks up a comb, ruthlessly dragging it through her long, curly hair. "There's no schedule to keep for this," she says, wincing as she hits a snarl. "You're ready when you're ready. It'll be soon, I'm sure."

"I've been ready for a long time. I'm afraid they think I'm too weak."

"Oh, Jowan," Marian sighs. She wraps her freshly-combed hair into a messy bun and ties it off. "You worry too much."

"Is that what you think?" Jowan says tonelessly, but he smiles a little when her worried gaze snaps to his face. "Sorry to waste your time with all this," he says. "I was supposed to tell you to see Irving as soon as you woke up."

"What?" Marian yelps. Automatically she glances at the windows and the hour-candles; it's late afternoon already. "Where is he?"

"His study, of course." Jowan shrugs and levers himself up, off her bed. "You should go. Don't want to keep him waiting."

Marian brushes down her robes, checks the nape of her neck for stray locks of hair, then turns for the nearest door. She curses when she sees the two girls standing next to it. They're the worst gossips in the apprentice dorms, and the instigators of many an interrogation session that would put Chantry Seekers to shame.

They don't show any signs of moving, but they also look engrossed in their gossip. Maybe she can slip by while they aren't paying attention. She'd reached the door before what they were saying had a chance to penetrate.

"...that templar, Cullen, said it was the quickest, cleanest Harrowing he's ever seen. He says she's very talented and very brave."

Marian freezes.

"But he would say that, wouldn't he?" They both laugh and go into the lavatory. Thank the Maker for small mercies, because neither notice Marian awkwardly hanging around, listening to them gossip.

Marian shakes herself and slips out the door, closing it very softly behind her. _I wonder what they meant by that?_ She ducks through the library, doing her best to avoid being waylaid by the apprentices hanging around, and takes the stairs up to the second floor. She shivers as she passes the Tranquil Owain and thumbs the Maker's Circle on her chest to ward away bad luck. She hates the Tranquil. She sees herself in them, and she knows exactly which part they're lacking. Looking at them is like looking in a mirror and seeing absolutely nothing at all; she stays away as much as she can.

Everyone she passes has a comment or a kind word or a question for her, and it takes her all of an hour to get through the mage library. Old Sweeney takes half of that time with reminiscing.

Irving's office is at the end of one of the curving half-sections, just before the third floor stairs. Marian knows she's supposed to go straight there, but she can't help ducking into the mage quarters on this floor and looking at her new rooms for the first time. She's never had a room of her own, or a bed that wasn't shared, and while she's going to enjoy the quiet, all she can see when she looks at her hard-won freedoms is that it's finally time to plan her escape.

Freedom's been her dream for ten years, and it's never been closer to her hand than it is right now. A slow burn of wild exultation begins to burn in her chest; she thinks about dancing, and laughs out loud. Marian drifts more than walks out of the rooms and back into the hallway, turning right to go to Irving's office, and actually walks right into a templar's cuirass.

She comes back down to earth with a thump and looks up, her mouth open to apologize.

It's Cullen.

He's got his hands up, ready to catch her, but Marian hastily takes a step back and smiles. "My apologies, Ser Cullen," she says. "I wasn't watching where I was going."

She can't get the gossiping apprentices out of her mind, or the one downstairs who had brushed past her and whispered _I hear Cullen's in love with you_.

It's nothing more than idle fancy, and she's heard that kind of thing before in the hothouse atmosphere of the Tower, but it's information Marian has no idea what to do with. Nor does she know how to talk to the man in front of her.

"No - no matter," Cullen says, swallowing. He drops his arms too quickly and his gauntlets clash against his fauld. "I... I am glad to see your Harrowing went smoothly."

Well, perhaps she's not the only one.

"As am I, ser," Marian says, smiling. "As am I."

Cullen's voice drops a little; she leans in slightly to hear him better. "Th-they picked me as the templar to strike the killing blow if... if you became an abomination." She doesn't know what look comes over her face, but it must have been something, because Cullen waves his hands in agitation. "It's nothing personal! I'm – " He swallows. "I'm just glad you're all right. You know."

There's something adorably endearing about the way he can't seem to get out a sentence without tripping over his words. Marian has sworn to herself never to trust anyone in the Tower, templar or mage, but in truth, she's never even been tempted, until now. Cullen is a good man, which is all too rare among the templars.

Even so, Marian can't help but tease him a little. "Would you really have struck me down?"

"I would have felt terrible about it," Cullen confesses, his face solemn. "But... I serve the Chantry and the Maker, and I will do as I am commanded."

All her levity flees at his words. She's a little ashamed of herself, in fact. "I'm glad it was you," Marian says in all seriousness, and struck by a sudden notion, she steps close, lifts herself up on her tiptoes, and kisses Cullen's cheek. When she draws back their eyes meet; his are very serious, and Marian hopes he can see the sincerity in hers. "Thank you, Ser Cullen."

"You're welcome, Mistress Amell." Cullen bows a little at the waist.

Marian doesn't know what his real feelings for her are, or if he in fact has any, but in that moment she loves him a little.

She steps back and says lightly, "I am distracting you from something very important, I'm sure."

"Oh, you're not distracting. I mean, you are, but... " Cullen covers his eyes for a moment, exasperated. "You're not. I mean, you can talk to me anytime if you want."

Marian grins at him and this time he grins back, shy but appealing; then she goes on her way and Cullen goes on his.

Irving's office is the third door after that, on the outside. As she approaches the door, she can hear Greagoir using his outdoor voice. It's tempting to dawdle in the hall until he leaves, but she's already late enough, and in any case Irving has never minded having an audience for Greagoir's temper. She slips in through the open doorway.

Her ears have deceived her; there is another man there, watching Greagoir and Irving argue with thinly disguised impatience. He is tall and very dark, and wears armor quite unlike the full plate the templars never take off; over top lies blue and white livery, emblazoned with two griffons back to back. It's the Grey Warden heraldry, Marian knows, and she can't help but feel a thrill of excitement climb up her spine. A Grey Warden? Here?

The Warden looks away from the arguing men and sees her hovering beside the door. "Irving, someone is here to see you." Greagoir pauses, mid-sentence, and he and Irving both turn to look at her. The warden gives her a faint smile, which she returns; she knows exactly how loud they can get, and she sympathizes.

"Marian, my dear!" Irving says with a smile, coming toward her, hands outstretched. "Congratulations on your ascension to the Circle." Marian hears what he's not saying: _Congratulations on not dying_.

She knows that in Irving's eyes, she has just become - not an adult, because she is only eighteen; Irving patronizes Leorah just as much as he does the newest apprentice, and she is near thirty - but she is now part of a smaller group, one he has to pay attention to.

There is a surprising amount of politicking among the senior mages for the post of First Enchanter. The post is traditionally appointed by the Knight-Commander, but even he listens to the tides of power and opinion in the Tower. The posturing for influence and precedence gets sort of silly sometimes, and Marian is sure that Irving and Greagoir encourage it; perhaps they think that if mages are pursuing worldly power, they won't also become maleficars. It seems short-sighted to her, but of course nobody has ever asked for _her_ opinion.

Marian has just graduated to the status of full Circle mage, and that makes her a new quarry for the influence games; she has just completed a very fast Harrowing, and that marks her as someone to watch. She will be courted by the various fraternities, the Isolationists, the Libertarians, and the rest. She inclines to the Aequitarians on strictly moral grounds; they believe that mages must hold themselves to a code and ruling oneself above all. But in the end, none of the politics or philosophies matter a damn to her, because she is getting out and leaving all this far behind.

But if she doesn't want anyone to become suspicious at her complete lack of interest, she's going to have to play the game.

_Damn it_.

Marian smiles at Irving. "You sent for me, First Enchanter?"

"Yes, of course," he says, gesturing for her to come further into the room. She comes to meet them, stopping besides Greagoir, who greets her with a stiff nod.

"This is...?" The warden murmurs to Irving, watching her intently.

Irving nods. "Yes, this is she."

Marian turns that over in her mind for a moment - Irving has been talking about her? He's been claiming credit as her mentor, of course. Perhaps that's all there is to it.

"Well, Irving, you're obviously busy. We will discuss this later," Greagoir says and stumps out of the room, his armor making cheerful jangling sounds in direct contrast to his obviously poor temper.

"I look forward to it," Irving says, his voice saying exactly the opposite, and then he beams at Marian and the man next to him. "But I've been remiss! Marian, this is Duncan, of the Grey Wardens. And Duncan, this is Marian Amell, our newest Circle Mage."

"Pleased to meet you," Marian says, and she means it. The Grey Wardens are everyone's favorite bedtime story; she never thought she'd meet one in person.

Duncan bows to her and comes up wearing a smile, one that says he knows exactly what she's thinking. "Good day, Mistress Amell," he says. His voice is very deep.

"You've heard about the war brewing to the south, I expect? Duncan is recruiting mages to join the king's army at Ostagar."

"You're recruiting here?" Marian asks. "For mages or for templars?"

"For mages, I hope," Duncan answers. "Although as I understand it, the templars would come with you free of charge."

Marian is sorely tempted to ask for permission to go, although she knows it will be denied; she is too fresh off her Harrowing to be sent anywhere, especially the front lines of a darkspawn war. "I hope you find what you need, ser," she says instead.

"As do I, Mistress," Duncan replies, his eyes thoughtful. "With the darkspawn invading, we need all the help we can get, especially from the Circle. I fear if we don't drive them back, we may see another Blight."

Irving laughs. "Duncan, you worry the poor girl with talk of Blights and darkspawn. This is a happy day for her."

"We live in troubled times, my friend," Duncan says, a note of reproving in his voice.

"All the more reason to seize on moments of levity when they occur." Irving smiles beatifically at her. Marian feels a little bit like a prize horse being inspected by its owner; maybe she'll be asked to show her teeth next? Unaware of her increasingly defiant thoughts, Irving continues, "The Harrowing is behind you. Your phylactery was sent to Denerim. You are officially a mage within the Circle of Magi."

It's the first time anyone has so much as mentioned where the phylacteries are kept. Irving can't be so stupid as to just _give_ her the only information she needs to make a successful escape. He _can't_.

Can he?

Perhaps it's not so large a stretch – after all, she has never been rebellious except in the confines of her mind, and Denerim is across the entire kingdom. It might not even be true.

"I am honored, First Enchanter," she says calmly. Marian has been given many gifts today, and the possibility of her freedom is the most precious.

Duncan looks from Irving to Marian, confused. "I'm sorry – what is this phylactery?"

"Blood is taken from all apprentices when they first come to the tower and is preserved in special vials," Irving explains.

It's Chantry-sanctioned blood magic to keep mages on the leash, of course, but somehow that's an acceptable compromise to them.

Marian admits she might be a little biased.

"So they can be hunted if they turn apostate." Does she imagine the reproach in Duncan's voice?

"We have few choices. The gift of magic is looked upon with suspicion and fear. We must prove we are strong enough to handle our power responsibly." Irving shakes his head and turns to Marian. "You have done this. You now have the right to wear Circle robes, to bear a Circle staff, and wear a ring bearing the Circle's insignia, all of which can be found in your new quarters. Wear them proudly, for you have earned them."

"Yes, First Enchanter," Marian says, bowing a little. The acolyte staves are notoriously underpowered, and she can't wait to get her hands on a proper staff.

Irving waves her off with a warning not to talk about the Harrowing and asks her to escort Duncan to his guest quarters. Marian does her best not to drill him with questions on the walk, but she can't resist asking just one or maybe two about the Grey Wardens; Duncan seems willing to talk, and she lingers in his quarters for a moment until she notices how tired he looks.

Marian excuses herself with a smile and leaves the guest chamber. In the hallway, waiting for her, is Jowan.


	5. The Maleficar

"Jowan, my friend," Marian says, collecting Jowan's arm and dragging him along with her as she goes down the hallway toward her new quarters. "If you're stalking me, we're going to have _words_."

"You'll have to catch me first," he says, with a small smile that immediately vanishes. "Look, I need your help."

Marian hisses at him to quiet him; she deposits him in her room while she checks the two other separated rooms that make up the mages' quarters on this floor. They're empty, and she returns to her own to find Jowan pacing anxiously. He stops as soon as he sees her.

"Well?" he asks.

"They're empty," Marian says. She keeps her voice down anyway; there are no doors to the individual rooms, and the hallway door stands open.

"Do you remember what we talked about this morning?"

Marian prays for patience. "I'm not going to tell you about the Harrowing. I wish you'd stop asking!"

"But..." Jowan frowns. "Wait a moment." He leaves her with no more explanation than that, and Marian scoffs. _He has a funny way of asking for help_, she thinks, but Jowan has always been secretive in a completely infuriating way.

Her Circle robes, staff, and ring are lying on the bed, and she immediately picks up the staff. It's similar to her acolyte staff in looks and weight, but when she tentatively queries it with her magic, she can immediately feel that it's quite different in reactivity and magical throughput. It'll be interesting to see what kind of power she can obtain with it. She puts on the ring, etched with the symbol of the Circle, and sets the robes aside; Jowan could return at any second, and she doesn't have a changing screen.

Her thoughts inevitably return to her phylactery, and to Denerim. The maps in the library suggest that with a fast horse it could be no more five days ride from the docks, but she cannot leave without more information; wandering around Denerim looking for a secret Templar warehouse is a terrible idea, bound to end in tears.

She can hear Jowan coming back, so she sits on her bed and waits. When he comes through the open doorway of her room, he is not alone.

The girl with him is wearing Chantry initiate robes, but underneath them she's lovely, all auburn hair and glowing eyes. Jowan is holding her hand, as if he has a perfect right to do so, as if she is not sworn to _Andraste_.

"Jowan," Marian says in utter and complete horror. "What have you _done_?"

"This is Lily," Jowan says.

Marian opens her mouth to reply with some heat, but something in his eyes stops her, something proud and wondering and terrified. Stepping on that feels like stepping on a kitten. "Oh, Maker," she groans. "Why are you doing this to me? Do you know what Greagoir's going to do to all of us when you get caught?"

"Thumbscrews and the rack?" Jowan offers with a smile.

"No, that's what _I'll_ do," she grumbles, but she doesn't mean any of it, and Jowan knows it. Marian gives up the impossible task of making Jowan feel the least little bit of shame about anything and turns to Lily. "Forgive me," Marian says, smiling. "You have my condolences, for what it's worth."

"Oy!" Jowan protests.

Lily smiles. "I can see why the two of you are friends."

"Oh, ouch," Marian says, then laughs. "Hoist on my own petard, I see. All right." She falls silent for a moment, and when Jowan doesn't immediately start talking, she says, "You can't have got me in here to chat about love."

"I wish that was the only thing I needed to talk about." He glances at Lily. "Remember I said that I didn't think they wanted to give me my Harrowing? I know why. They're... going to make me Tranquil."

Marian frowns. It sounds like more of Jowan's paranoia from earlier, but... "How do you know?"

"I saw the document on Greagoir's table," Lily says, distressed. "It authorized the Rite on Jowan. Irving had signed it."

Marian wishes she were more surprised, but she's always known that Irving isn't the sort to stick his neck out for the axe. "What are you going to do?" she asks.

"We need your help!" Jowan cries, releasing Lily's hand and dropping to one knee before Marian. "Please, Marian. Lily and I can't do this on our own."

If it were anyone else, Marian would at least think about her answer, but Jowan has helped her, schemed with her, studied with her, and supported her. "Of course I'll help," Marian agrees immediately. She puts her hand on Jowan's head, comforting for a moment before she ruffles his hair on that side. "What do you need?"

"Your word on it?" Lily asks, her eyes very steady.

Marian studies her for a moment; she likes what she sees. Lily is strong where Jowan is sometimes weak; they will be good for each other, given the chance. "You have it."

Jowan sighs in relief and stands. "I knew you'd help," he says, smoothing down his rumpled hair.

"Because I'm a _sucker_," Marian grumbles, but he's right – there was never any possibility of her saying no.

Lily and Jowan explain their plan, what there is of it; naturally, it's missing all the important details, like how to keep the templars away, what to do with Jowan's phylactery after they steal it, and exactly how they're going to get out of the Tower afterward and across the lake without the templars noticing.

"Your brilliant plan is to blow up the door leading to the phylacteries?" Marian asks, dumbfounded. "You know the cells are down there, right? The ones they keep Anders locked up in? They won't have to take you far to lock you up. Oh, _Maker_," she says, covering her face with her hands. "Don't talk to me. Let me just – I'm going to go get a rod of fire. You try not to come up with any more ridiculous plans while I'm gone."

Marian refuses to think about Jowan's plan anymore, in the hopes that refusing to think about it will make it less stupid. Naturally, Owain won't hand over a rod of fire on a whim, so she needs a senior enchanter who will sign her request form without actually thinking about it.

Another hour of her life later, she has a signed request form for a rod of fire and Old Man Sweeney has remembered her name for the first time in ten years.

Marian hesitates before turning out of the library into the circular area that is the heart of this floor, where the storeroom is located. She could turn Jowan and Lily in to Irving, she knows. In all honesty, they'll probably be caught at the docks, or the small village on the shore of the lake. She might even be doing them a favor.

Marian rolls her eyes at herself; she knows perfectly well she's not going to betray them. Even if Jowan weren't her friend, even if she hadn't liked Lily practically on sight... all Marian wants is to escape the Tower, and she can't deny other people the opportunity she would so dearly like to take for herself. Neither will she condemn her friend to a fate worse than death.

With Sweeney's signature on her requisition form, Owain hands over the rod of fire with no questions asked. Marian gathers Jowan and Lily from her room on her way to the stairs; a mage, an apprentice, and an initiate attract a few looks going through the library on the first floor, but nobody stops them as they pass through the basement and the Victim's Door to reach the door of the reliquary.

She uses the rod of fire on the door's locks.

Nothing happens.

"Why isn't it working?" Lily asks.

"I don't know," Marian says, distracted. She reaches out to the rod with her magic, feeling along the pathways of her skin into the rod –

It's not working. Something is blocking her magic from moving outside of her skin. Marian tries again, unease climbing her spine in shuddery waves that lift the hairs on the back of her neck, but again her magic is blocked at the point where it would leave her body.

Marian has never not been able to do this.

"Lily..." Jowan says, the same unease she's feeling clearly present in his voice. "I can't cast spells here. Nothing works."

Marian immediately tries to cast the very first spell she learnt as an apprentice, a simple floating light that doesn't require a staff. She cups her hands together and encourages her magic to pool in the way she was taught, but nothing happens. Jowan is right. Neither of them can cast anything. She's never felt so defenseless or exposed.

"Oh, no," Lily says, touching the door and tracing the most intricate of the stone carvings that cover the door. "Oh, I never thought of this. These are _wards_. Anti-magic wards."

Without conscious thought Marian takes a step back, away from the door. "Templars can do that?" she asks uneasily.

"I didn't know," Lily says, fingers still on the stone carving as she turns to speak to Jowan. "But I should have guessed – why else would they use ordinary keys?"

"How are we going to get in now?" Jowan asks. This is usually the part where he panics, and Marian can only hope that he'll keep it together in front of Lily.

Marian eyes the door, backing up a little more. The hinges are on the inside, so they can't dismantle the door, and the stone is thick and strong. They won't be getting through here, not without magic.

"Maybe there's another entrance around the side?" she suggests.

Jowan scoffs. "What are the chances of that?"

"If there isn't one," Marian says grimly, striding toward the other door that leads into the basements proper, "I'll _make_ one."

Her words are more accurate than she knows; Marian does indeed have to make a door into the phylactery chamber, but after that they're inside, with nothing between them and Jowan's phylactery except a really angry animated Guardian.

She finishes it off with a lightning strike and gestures for Jowan to precede her up the stairs to a long, low table strewn with phials. "Which one?" she asks, looking between the phials; they are all different shapes, some with round, bulbous bottoms, some look like wine bottles, and others look like reused potion bottles.

"I don't know," Jowan says with some distress. "I never thought that I wouldn't be able to tell."

_Of course you didn't_, Marian thinks, clenching her teeth to keep from saying it right out loud. He has thought none of this through, and Lily is so blind with love that she will follow him anywhere when she should be leading him by the nose so he won't do anything stupid.

She picks up the nearest phial and thanks the Maker and all his servants when she turns it over and finds that it's labeled neatly on the bottom:

_9:24 Dragon_

_Llewellyn_

They check the bottom of every phylactery until they find Jowan's, neatly labeled _9:18 Dragon_. "I can't believe this tiny vial is all that stands between me and freedom," he says, wondering. "It's so fragile."

He's talking more to himself than to either of them, and neither reply. Jowan opens his hand and lets the phial drop; it shatters on the stone, spraying blood and glass everywhere. He scrubs his toe in the blood, smearing it a little, then spins and grabs Lily, hugging her and laughing. "I'm free!"

Lily laughs with him, looking down at him with something soft and delighted on her face. Marian doesn't have the heart to disturb them... but they're not free yet, no matter what they think. Next they must get past the templars guarding the front doors, and then they must brave the lake.

"We have to hurry," she reminds them, and they reluctantly part. Marian tries the inside of the first door, the one they had been unable to open; this time it opens easily, and when it does she feels the ward dissipate like so much cloud in the breeze. They leave the basement, each step quicker than the last; they're almost laughing when they burst out of the basement door. The end is nearly in sight.

Greagoir's voice interrupts their relieved laughter, silencing them in an instant. "So what you said was true, Irving."

"G-greagoir!" Lily stammers, shocked.

He has obviously been waiting for them; he stands with Irving and two templars, arms folded and a scowl on his face. A thousand stories flicker through Marian's mind, but in the end there is no story that will prevent Greagoir from checking the phylactery chamber if he has the slightest suspicion of what they've been doing.

Still, she would do it again, and that thought squares her shoulders and lifts her chin. She will not be intimidated.

And maybe she and Anders can talk to each other in their cells.

"Good evening, Knight-Commander," Marian says, keeping her voice steady through an effort of will. Something flickers in Greagoir's eyes, something that looks like unwilling respect, and then it's gone; but that gives her something to hold on to. Greagoir appreciates courage, and loyalty, and civilized behavior; he will set the length of their sentences, and it's best they stay on his good side.

Greagoir shakes his head. "An initiate, conspiring with a blood mage. I'm disappointed, Lily."

Marian stares at him, too shocked to protest or question and too scared to say anything at all. A blood mage? This isn't just solitary confinement material; collaboration with a blood mage is grounds for the Rite of Tranquility. Or worse.

Greagoir beckons to Lily and she obeys, standing before him with her head bowed. He lifts her chin and examines her eyes. "She seems shocked, but fully in control of her own mind," he says over his shoulder to Irving. "Not a thrall of the blood mage, then."

Marian isn't entirely sure she's breathing. She is not a blood mage, and she cannot believe it of Jowan; this is all a mistake, a terrible mistake that will be cleared up. None of the awful things she is imagining are going to happen.

She bites her lip. If only she believed herself.

"The initiate has betrayed us. The Chantry will not let this go unpunished." Greagoir lets Lily go; she steps back into submissive invisibility, something she must have learned in the Chantry, before Greagoir turns on Marian. "And this one – newly a mage, and already flouting the rules of the Circle."

Marian swallows.

Irving sighs. "I'm disappointed in you, child. You could have told me what you knew of this plan, and you didn't."

Marian ruthlessly suppresses the instinct to tell Irving exactly what she thinks of him; it will not make an iota of difference, and in fact will make this horrible situation even worse, but oh how she _wants_ to. If she'd told him what Jowan was planning, he would have betrayed all three of them in an instant for some momentary advantage in a power play with Greagoir or one of the factions.

"You don't care for the mages!" Jowan says, anger in every word. Marian winces. "You just bow to the Chantry's every whim!"

"Enough!" Greagoir strides forward toward them, the force of his steps making his armor clash more than usual. "As knight-commander of the templars here assembled, I sentence this blood mage to death."

He's not looking at her, Marian realizes; he's looking at Jowan. They can't possibly think Jowan is a blood mage, and she opens her mouth to say so before Greagoir continues, pointing one massive gauntleted finger at Lily. "This initiate has scorned the Chantry and her vows. Take her to Aeonar."

_Aeonar?_ Marian darts a look at Lily, who's just gone even more pale than usual. "The... the mages' prison. No..." She's begging and backing away from them until she steps out over the empty space at the top of the stairs leading down to the basement; Marian just catches Lily's arm before she can fall. "Please, no," Lily says, desperately clinging to Marian's arm. "Not there."

Marian happens to catch Jowan's shoulders tighten out of the corner of her eye; she knows it's not a good sign, but she can't reach him from where she stands. "Jowan..." she says, warning him off.

But Jowan's not listening anymore. "No! I won't let you touch her!" he shouts; he reaches into his robes and pulls out a little knife, rounded near the hilt and very sharp. The idea that he could take on three templars and the First Enchanter with a little knife like that – Marian starts to shout at him, and Lily is clinging to her arm, keeping her from reaching him –

Jowan drives the knife down into his own hand. He bleeds, and he bleeds, and bleeds; instead of thinning out and slowing down, the blood flow increases, spattering everyone and everything within reach. Jowan says one sharp word and gestures with his wounded hand, and the blood leaps up from the floor to surround the templars, Greagoir, and Irving. Then they collapse, abruptly, like a marionette with cut strings.

"Jowan," Marian breathes in horror. "Jowan, _what have you done_?"

"I couldn't let them take you," Jowan says, turning. He's talking to Lily, of course, and there's an obscure pain in her chest; even after all this, after everything that's happened, Marian resents Lily for coming between her and the best friend she's ever had.

She supposes she didn't really require an answer to her question, in any case. The apprentices have been buzzing for days about a blood mage somewhere in the Tower, and for once, they've stumbled on the right answer. It explains everything - his mood swings, his absences, his terror over the Harrowing. It explains everything except _why_.

"Blood magic?" Lily says, still clinging to Marian. "By the Maker – how _could_ you?" Her voice is full of the same betrayal Marian is feeling. "You said – you _promised_..."

"I just dabbled!" Jowan says, holding his hands out entreatingly. "I thought... I hoped it would make me a better mage!"

Lily shakes her head, her eyes very wide in her face. "Blood magic is _evil_. It corrupts everything it touches."

"I'm going to give it all up!" Jowan says, pleading. "Everything, all the magic. I just want to be with you, Lily – I love you. Come with me. Please."

Lily looks at him for what seems like an age. "I trusted you," she says eventually, letting go of Marian's arm. She steps forward, toward Jowan, and he is forced to back away as she moves; the betrayal on her face is unbearable. "I was ready to sacrifice everything for you." Lily breaks off, shaking her head. The quiet strength that Marian had so admired before is back. "I don't know you, blood mage. Stay away from me."

But she points to the exit.

Even that is a concession; Lily and Marian together probably can't overcome his blood magic, but they could try. Lily still bears the mace and shield Marian stole for her, and Marian has a trick or two up her sleeves Jowan has not seen yet.

Jowan opens his mouth, then closes it again. His shoulders slump and his head bows, the very image of a defeated man. He turns to leave, and that's when he sees Marian, standing exactly where she's been this entire hellish confrontation.

"Marian..." Jowan has said her name like that a thousand times, whenever he needs help, and she has always given it to him if she could. She doesn't honestly know what he wants from her this time, but whatever it is, she cannot give it to him.

"Go," Marian says, her heart heavy. "While you still can."

Jowan hesitates for a moment more, then heads for the front doors at a run. He doesn't look back, and after one last glance, she lets him go.

With Jowan's disappearance, the group on the floor starts to stir; Marian moves to help Irving, who is old and feeble and the only one of the four who will accept a mage's touch. He sits up with only a little difficulty. "Are you all right, child? Where's Greagoir?"

"I am here," Greagoir says, struggling only a little under the weight of his plate armor when he stands. "I knew it... blood magic. But to overcome so many – I never thought him capable of such power."

"I didn't know." Marian feels an overwhelming urge to make them understand, make them realize that she had no idea. "I never thought... I thought I knew him."

"None of us expected _this_," Irving says while she helps him to his feet.

Greagoir turns on Irving. "If you had let me act sooner – "

"You cannot know that," Irving interjects.

"Now we have a blood mage on the loose and no way to track him down," Greagoir continues as if Irving hasn't spoken at all.

"You'll think of something." Irving dismisses Greagoir the way Marian wishes he would do more often.

Greagoir grunts, displeased, before rounding on Lily. "And you! You helped a blood mage! Look at all he's hurt!"

Lily squares her shoulders. "Yes, Knight-Commander. I was accomplice to a... a blood mage," she says, swallowing. "I will accept whatever punishment you see fit. Even... even Aeonar."

"She didn't know," Marian objects.

"Thank you, but I can speak for myself," Lily says, and though her voice is not unkind, it's a command. Marian does not object further, though she wants to.

Greagoir gestures to the silent templars who have been with him the entire time. "Get her out of my sight." They come forward and take her arms, and Lily is led away, just like that.

After they go, only Greagoir and Irving are left with her. Marian is acutely aware of her part in this sordid episode, and she is the only one yet unpunished. That won't last, she knows; Greagoir will never let anything like this slide. She will be made an example to the others.

Greagoir turns on her. "You! You know why the repository exists. Some artifacts – some magics – are locked away for a reason."

Marian bows her head. She _is_ sorry, in a way – sorry she ever woke up this morning. But that will not help her, so she stays silent, waiting.

"You have made a mockery of the Circle," Greagoir says, when it is obvious she doesn't intend to speak. "What are we to do with you? You helped a blood mage escape. All our prevention measures for naught – because of you!"

Marian is caught between her guilt and her defiance. Helping a blood mage escape – but the Circle is a prison, another part of her argues, and they should all be free... She goes around in circles without deciding anything.

Greagoir opens his mouth to proclaim her sentence – Tranquility or death, her mind whispers – but another voice from behind her cuts him off. "Knight-Commander, if I may..." It's Duncan, the Grey Warden.

It's only because Marian is watching every little detail of Greagoir's expression that she notices him close his eyes and sigh, just a little.

Duncan comes up behind her, and she turns to look at him. "I am not only looking for mages to join the king's army, I am also recruiting for the Grey Wardens. Irving spoke highly of this mage, and I would like her to join the Warden ranks."

Marian has no idea what to say. It sounds heaven-sent – a chance to escape, and to avoid whatever torment Greagoir has in mind, but in another way she feels that she doesn't deserve it. Whatever reasons she may have had, whatever she knew or didn't know, she has helped a blood mage escape the templars.

"Marian has assisted a maleficar," Irving says. His voice is cool and lacks its usual ingratiating notes. "She has shown a lack of regard for the Circle's rules."

Greagoir nods. "She is a danger. To all of us."

"But it is a rare person who risks all for a friend in need," Duncan says thoughtfully. Marian is not so sure – she's been manipulated and deceived twice in one day, and that doesn't speak well for her. "I stand by my decision. I will recruit Mistress Amell."

"You may not have her," Greagoir growls, folding his arms. "She must be punished, not rewarded; an example must be set for the rest."

"And what does she want?" Duncan asks, catching her eye.

Marian hesitates. She wants to leave – she cannot question that goal, not after so long, but she doesn't know what might be required from her in the Grey Wardens. It could be a case of jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

And yet anything she can imagine seems better than the Circle, and the templars, and the things that happen in the dark.

"I will go, ser," Marian finally answers in a low voice. "If you will have me, I will go."

"No!" Greagoir protests.

"Greagoir, mages are needed," Duncan says. "_This_ mage is needed. Worse things plague this world than blood mages – you know that." He locks eyes with Greagoir, and after a long moment, Greagoir is the one who looks away. "I take this young mage under my wing and bear all responsibility for her actions."

Greagoir laughs bitterly. "A blood mage escapes, and his accomplice is not only unpunished, but is rewarded by becoming a Grey Warden. Are our rules nothing? Have we lost all authority over our mages? This does not bode well, Irving."

This is not the first time Greagoir has talked about the mages of the Circle like they're his dogs. Marian stamps on the familiar outrage simmering in her veins before she makes any more trouble; she is for the Wardens now, and speaking up at this point in the conversation is probably a bad idea.

Irving sighs. "Peace, Greagoir. We have no more say in this matter."

"What now?" Marian asks Duncan.

Duncan takes her elbow and steers her gently toward the hallway that leads to the front doors. "We must make our way to Ostagar, where the king's army is camped. You will be initiated there. I will explain more when the time comes."

Marian packs while Duncan retrieves his things from the second floor; she rips open the straw bedding of her tiny bunk bed in the apprentice dorm and retrieves the only two things in the world she cares about: the toys she'd stolen from the twins before she left home. She stuffs them into the bottom of her pack and covers them with clothing and any spare rags she can find in the lavatory. There are a few apprentices watching her, but none of them try to speak to her, and she ignores them as much as she can. They've probably heard all about her offenses already; the Tower gossips are very efficient.

Duncan is waiting for her with two saddlebags when she comes out of the dorm. "Are you ready?" he asks.

Marian nods. There is nothing left for her here, and no one to say goodbye to.

"Good," he says, and leads them to the front doors; the templars guarding them let them pass, and then she is free.


	6. The Hinterlands

AN: On reaching the sudden and inevitable plot hole that is Jowan's entire existence, I've had to throw out nearly everything that the game tells us about distances and travel time.

Also, thank you so much for the reviews and the follows and the favorites. They mean a great deal to me and I treasure every one.

* * *

Marian has not been on a horse in ten years, and she has never been on a horse alone. Her arse is not happy about the change.

Duncan has kept her riding hard since they left the Tower, and she is _tired_, body and soul. A curious numbness has insinuated itself between her and her emotions, and while she is grateful for it, Marian knows it won't last. Her dreams tonight should be... interesting. She's disinclined to do anything except stare at her horse's ears.

Her horse slows and steps carefully off the road and through a field to the left. She glances up only to find that Duncan has taken her horse's trailing reins; he's guiding them to a ruined cottage, with thatch half gone and what looks like half a tree taking root inside. It's so _dark_; Marian is used to the Tower, where light is cheap and the library lamps are left burning all night long. The cottage is surrounded by trees, and the shadows underneath their branches are deep and liquid.

"I use this place as a way station," Duncan says, bringing his horse to a stop with his heels. Her horse drifts forward a little, but he stops eventually. "You would do well to remember it; there is an intact fireplace under the side with the roof."

Marian nods and then, sighing, she more or less rolls herself off the saddle and drops down to the ground. She can't quite help the pained noise she makes – she is _incredibly_ sore – but Duncan says nothing, only glances at her and dismounts himself, leading their horses around the back of the cottage. Marian follows, for lack of anything else to do, and finds him already picketing them in a small clearing partially overshadowed by a tree.

When he starts to take the saddle and other things off of his own horse, Marian watches him for a moment and then steps to her horse, copying him as best she can with her height disadvantage and hands unused to the task. Duncan smiles his approval, and her mouth turns up a little in response; then she accepts the cloth he hands her, and they rub the horses down. It's soothing, in a way; the motions are repetitive, and the horse makes some sort of happy noises when she figures out what she's doing. She lets her mind drift, and she's surprised when Duncan takes her hand.

"They're all right now," he says, and takes the cloth.

"Oh, good," Marian says, a little disappointed. She scratches her horse on his shoulder, and he amiably turns his head and butts her in the stomach.

Duncan laughs. "You've made a friend," he says, and gestures for her to precede him into the cottage. "I'll be in after I water them."

She hesitates on the verge of crossing into the interior, but it's not much darker inside than it is out; the roof lets in a bit of starlight, and she can see where to put her feet to avoid the cracked paving stones that floor the cottage. The tree growing through the wall yields a few dead, dry sticks and Marian builds a tiny fire on a bare stone, lighting it with her thumb. It will last long enough for her to ask Duncan if he wants a real fire for the night.

Marian looks around for a bit of ground that's flatter than the rest; when she finds some along one wall, she lies down and stuffs her pack under her head. It will make as good a pillow as any. She folds her hands neatly over her stomach and stares up, through the branches of the nameless tree. They sway a little in a higher breeze and she watches them make patterns with the stars in the night sky. It is fully dark now, and the little fire she's made casts a cheerful light to keep her company.

Duncan has to duck his head to come in through the hole that was once a door. When he sees her little fire, he smiles and turns back to bar the doorway with the remains of the door. "We should be up with first light," he says, settling himself on the ground. "But we have time to eat, and you must have questions."

He offers her some crusty bread and cheese – she recognizes the Circle's mark on the bread – and a little salted cod from his packs, and they eat in companionable silence.

When they're done, Duncan offers her his bedroll; Marian accepts, under no illusions about how she's going to sleep tonight. She may as well be comfortable while she tosses and turns. She freezes her little fire and lies back, counting stars.

"How long have you been in the Circle?" he asks, when she says nothing.

"Ten years," Marian answers. She debates the pros and cons of telling him about her family; it can't make any difference to him either way, she finally decides, and a lifetime of holding her secrets close keeps her silent. "What can I expect my life to be now?"

Duncan is silent longer than she thinks the question warrants; she wonders if he's fallen asleep on her already, though it seems unlikely. She turns her head and scrutinizes his face in the pale, pale light of the new moon, just cresting through the tree branches; he looks sad.

Finally, he says, "In times of peace, Wardens train, and recruit, and watch for signs of the next Blight. Darkspawn make their way to the surface in smaller numbers whenever they find an exit from the Deep Roads, even when there is no Blight, and we must drive them back."

Marian frowns. "But that's not what's happening right now, is it?"

"No," Duncan admits. "The darkspawn are attacking en masse from the south. It may be that a Blight is coming."

"What makes it a Blight, instead of quite a lot of darkspawn?"

"An archdemon," Duncan says, his voice dropping. "You know the story?"

Marian laughs, little more than a huff of air. "It was the Revered Mother's favorite bedtime story in the Tower. The magisters corrupted the Golden City with their greed and wickedness and created the curse of the darkspawn," she repeats in a sing-song voice. "_You have brought Sin to Heaven_/_And doom upon all the world_. That's one lesson the Chantry doesn't want us to forget in a hurry. And, of course, whose fault it is."

"The darkspawn seek out the Old Gods," Duncan says. "They're drawn to them, and when they find one, the taint corrupts it. It awakens, in that moment, as a darkspawn of hideous power, and it leads the horde against the surface peoples. A Blight."

She shivers. After a moment, she asks, "And then Wardens fight?"

"Yes," Duncan agrees. "Then we fight."

They lie in silence for a while, and then Duncan asks for the details of her training; she is most proficient in the Primal spells. Entropy is her particular weakness. He wants to hear about her Harrowing, and there she tells him as little as she can get away with; she knows that he noticed her reticence, but she doesn't particularly care. She doesn't want to think about Mouse, or what he almost tricked her into doing.

"Your willpower saw you through your test," Duncan tells her, and she wonders if he has a sideline as a mind-reader. "Trust it; it will not fail you."

It's a cryptic statement that makes no sense to her, but Marian doesn't ask what he means; something in his voice stops her. He's not taking questions anymore.

"Thank you for recruiting me," she says instead. _Thank you for rescuing me._

"Thank me tomorrow," Duncan says coolly, and she turns away from him to face the wall.

She means to sleep, but sleep is not coming. Her mind is playing cruel tricks on her, replaying every instant of her Harrowing, of Jowan's pleas; how had she allowed herself to be gulled so badly?

She'd trusted Mouse. She'd trusted Jowan, too. It burns to realize that despite every oath she'd sworn to herself, she's just as much of a trusting fool as anyone else.

Marian sleeps fitfully, struggling with dreams that make no sense but leave her apprehensive when Duncan shakes her awake. They're on the road as soon as they re-saddle the horses, but no matter what she does, she can't seem to shake the lingering dread; four days later, when she catches sight of Ostagar in the distance, the looming, broken tips of the fortress seem to welcome her with cruel hands.


	7. The Ruins

When they began the journey, Marian thought she was in pain. Today she _knows_ she's in pain, a sadistic, grating pain that echoes through her bones and sinks deep into her muscles. It radiates from her arse up to mid-back and down through her knees. The stableman who takes her reins smirks as he leads her horse away, and she entertains thoughts of fireballing him until his head is the consistency of meat paste, but Duncan taps her on the shoulder and distracts her.

"This way," Duncan says, gesturing to the path leading into the fortress. It leads through truly gigantic arches to a path well-worn by many feet. She looks at the path and grimaces at the idea of walking, and Duncan must see the thought on her face, because he takes her arm and begins to lead her up the way. "I apologize for riding us so hard on the way here, but it was truly necessary," he says. "I cannot be absent on the eve of battle."

"I'll be fine," Marian says, and wills it to be so. It surprises her when it actually works, or maybe it's moving under her own power again; in any case, she feels less like she's going to die, and she detaches herself from Duncan's gently guiding hand with a smile.

Ostagar is situated on the top of a sharply inclined hill, and the path up to the main fortress is a series of switchbacks designed for artillery, built on the grand scale favored by the Tevinters.

It would be beautiful if she didn't have to climb to get there.

She follows Duncan up the path, keeping her eyes locked on his back; if she looks one more time to see how far they have yet to climb she's going to throw herself off the path and let gravity do what it will.

They reach the top and the switchbacks end, funneling into a single path that seems to bisect the ruins. The view is even more spectacular from here; she can see forever, it seems, over deep forest and swamp. Marian hurries a little to walk next to Duncan rather than a step behind and to the left, and that's when a giant in golden armor steps out, beaming at Duncan.

"Ho there, Duncan!" the giant calls.

"King Cailan?" Duncan says, surprised. He clasps forearms with the king while Marian hovers awkwardly in the background. "I wasn't expecting – "

"A royal welcome?" Cailan interjects. He laughs. "I was beginning to worry you'd miss all the fun!"

Duncan bows a little. "Not if I could help it, your Majesty."

The king is... not what she expected. He seems a little foolish, if truth be told, and it leaves her wondering how old he actually is. He's not as tall as she thought, either; he's only Duncan's height, and she doesn't think of _him_ as a giant. Perhaps it's the very shiny armor.

Cailan laughs again, clapping Duncan on the shoulder. "Then I'll have the mighty Duncan at my side in battle after all! Glorious!" He glances past Duncan at Marian, as if he is just noticing her. "The other Wardens told me you've found a promising recruit. I take it this is she?"

"Allow me to introduce you, your Majesty," Duncan says, gesturing to Marian.

"No need to be so formal, Duncan. We'll be shedding blood together, after all." Cailan turns to Marian, and while she's not impressed with his kingly demeanor, she's still bizarrely nervous; she's never met a king before, and she's not sure how to behave. "Ho there, friend!" he says, smiling. "Might I know your name?"

Marian ruthlessly stamps on the part of her that wants to be sarcastic, and answers, "Marian Amell, your Majesty." She follows Duncan's lead and bows a little, awkward with anxiety.

"Pleased to meet you! The Grey Wardens are desperate to bolster their numbers, and I, for one, am glad to help them." He seems genuinely pleased, and Marian relaxes a little. She smiles back. "I understand you hail from the Circle of Magi. I trust you have some spells to help us in the coming battle?"

"I will do my best, of course," she says cautiously. "But I've never been in battle before. I can make no guarantees."

"I understand," Cailan says, smiling a little. "We were all wet behind the ears once. We have several other mages here; perhaps one of them might ease your mind."

Marian had heard that some of the senior enchanters had left the Tower; at the time, she was busy studying, so she has no idea who might be here. It's not a bad idea, actually, and she looks at her king with more respect. Cailan's smile broadens, and Marian instantly feels herself flush red; somehow she's sure he knows what she's thinking. All her awkwardness returns.

"I'm sure the Wardens will benefit greatly with you in their ranks."

Marian mumbles something that sounds grateful in her head and retreats, thankful, when Cailan turns back to Duncan to continue their conversation. She lets it go in one ear and out the other as she brings herself back under control, an exercise of will that was one of the first things she'd learned in the Tower.

When she begins to pay attention again, Duncan gestures for her to move away; she does, but curiosity drives her to stay within earshot. "Your uncle sends greetings, your Majesty," he says softly. "And reminds you that Redcliffe forces could be here in less than a week."

Cailan snorts. "Eamon wants a piece of the glory, I'm sure," he says in the same soft tones, staring out over the Wilds. "Tomorrow will be no different than the last three battles. I'm not even sure this _is_ a Blight, to be honest."

"You doubt me?" Duncan's voice is unusually severe.

"Of course not," Cailan hastens to say. "But... there's been no sign of the archdemon."

"Are you disappointed, your Majesty?"

Cailan sighs and steps away, turning toward his guards. "I'd hoped for a war like in the tales," he says, his voice suddenly louder. Marian frowns, confused. "Imagine, a king riding with the fabled Grey Wardens against a tainted god!" He turns, laughing, and Marian is suddenly struck by how handsome the king is, even if he is a little weak, a little foolish. A golden king, set against the darkspawn; yes, Marian can see where the stories will start already.

"If I'm any later, Loghain will send out a search party," Cailan says. "Farewell, Grey Wardens!" And then there's nothing to do but bow as he walks away.

Marian blows out a silent breath and gives fleeting thought to the hope that she hasn't made a total fool of herself in front of the king of all Ferelden; then she forces herself to forget it.

"Well, isn't _he_ confident," Marian says without thinking, then frowns. Something about it seems off, though she can't put her finger on why. Something about _Cailan_ seems off.

She puts that away to think about later too – the list of things she's promised herself to think about later is longer than her arm – when Duncan begins leading her into the fortress proper. "They've won several battles against the darkspawn here," he says. "Perhaps he has good reason to be confident."

Marian takes a long look at Duncan, who seems entirely unconcerned. "Yet you don't seem entirely reassured."

"The horde grows larger with each passing day," he says. "By now, it's likely that they outnumber us. I _know_ that there is an archdemon behind this, and an archdemon can command hordes larger than anything we have yet seen..." Duncan sighs a little. "But I cannot ask the king to act solely on my feeling."

"Why not?" Marian asks. "At least he'd listen to you, unlike that other poor sod he was talking about." Something moves in Duncan's face like she's pained him, but she rushes on, unwilling to wait to see where she's put her foot in it this time. "What would you advise him to do?"

"We sent a call out west to the Wardens of Orlais," Duncan says, his face smoothing back into calm. "It will be many days before they can join us, but they will reinforce our numbers several times over. I would have the king simply wait."

"Waiting doesn't seem like his strong suit," Marian says as they descend a small set of steps that lead down to a bridge splayed out over a deep, tree-filled crevasse. Duncan stops and so does she, but that leaves her nowhere to look except out into the wilds.

Everywhere she looks, there's scenery and outdoors and height and depth; every time she looks up, she's overwhelmed by the way the sky seems to go on forever in all directions. Her hand tightens on the strap of her pack.

"It's not," Duncan admits with a smile. "We must do what we can and look to Teryn Loghain to make up the difference." He enunciates the name very clearly, and Marian suddenly realizes who he's talking about, and who she'd just called a poor sod.

Duncan laughs and kindly leaves the matter. "We should proceed with your Joining ritual without delay."

Marian looks up, her attention caught by his mention of a ritual. "Right now?" She doesn't dare rub her arse, not right in front of Duncan, but she desperately wants to – it _hurts_.

Perhaps he can guess what's on her mind, because he grins and gestures over the bridge to the other side of the fortress. "We have until nightfall; you may wander as you will, but don't leave the camp. When you're ready, find a Grey Warden named Alistair and tell him it's time to summon the other recruits."

"Alistair," Marian repeats to remember the name. "Got it."

"Until then, I have business I must attend to. I will be at the Grey Warden encampment, which is on the other side of the bridge and to the left, should you have need." Duncan bows to her, just a dip of his head, then strides off across the bridge.

She is alone for the first time in a very long time. The army camps are far enough away that they're little more than muted bursts of sound when the wind shifts, which happens just enough to remind her that there are other people in the world. Marian shivers suddenly and, taking a tight grip on the straps of her pack, heads across the bridge.

A friendly soldier points the way to the magi encampment and Marian heads that way. She can see a few mages inside, but she can also see another mage in the distance, one she recognizes.

"Wynne!"

Wynne turns, and when she sees Marian she smiles. "Marian! I heard that the new Grey Warden recruit was from the Circle, but I didn't think Irving would let you out of the Tower."

"He didn't have much of a choice," Marian says, grimacing, and lets her pack slide to the ground. "Listen, I hate to ask, but do you have a rejuvenate in you? The ride here was absolute murder."

"If you'd paid more attention in my classes..." Wynne says, narrowing her eyes, but Marian can feel the cool wash of a rejuvenation spell seep into her skin. The pain in her back and legs begins to fade.

"Oh, _thank_ you," Marian says, but Wynne cocks her head; then she feels a healing spell on top of the other.

"You shouldn't have let it get that bad," Wynne says, folding her arms. "And if you're going to be a Grey Warden, it's time you learned more than just the basic healing spells."

"I know," Marian says with a groan. "Well, now that I've passed my Harrowing, I'll have more time to learn other things."

"Congratulations! How did you do?"

Marian snorts. "Well, I passed," she says, gesturing vaguely to herself. "But I don't feel like I did. There was... " She pauses, waiting for the right words to come to her. "The demon, it... "

"Ah," Wynne says, tilting her head. "Mouse up to his old tricks?"

Marian stares at her, dumbfounded.

"You don't think you're the only one who fell for his tricks, do you?" Wynne asks, in a tone that Marian knows means that someone is being stupid and will be called to the front of the class for a demonstration. "Mouse has been Harrowing Fereldan apprentices for years, child. He has it down to a science. You slipped his grip, I take it?" Marian nods. "That's all that matters in the end. That, and now you know what lengths the demons will go to," Wynne says. Her voice has slipped into lecture mode, but Marian is too grateful to mind. "You must always be on guard in the Fade. You must make no agreements and make no choices, if you can help it."

It's more plain speaking than Marian's ever heard before. "Why don't you tell us this _before_ the Harrowing?" she asks, bewildered. "Wouldn't it help?"

"It would," Wynne agrees. "If all we cared for was keeping mages alive. But we need to know who is susceptible to a demon's temptations, and the Harrowing is the way that has evolved over many years. It seems harsh, I know, but the truth is often so."

Marian stares, horrified. "_Seems_?" she says, then clenches her teeth until she thinks her jaw might crack; arguing with Wynne is always a terrible idea, always, but the utter heartlessness of what she's just said – and apparently believes – is too much to bear. "You know they took Killian, right? And Alys? And _Jowan_ – " Her voice breaks, and she stops. She doesn't want to talk about that, and if she's absolutely truthful, Jowan was responsible for his own fate... but he would never have done what he did if he hadn't been terrified beyond reason of the Harrowing, and the Rite of Tranquility.

"They did not survive, I take it?" Wynne asks, and closes her eyes. "Maker preserve them," she murmurs. She looks honestly upset; Killian was Wynne's own special protégé, with not only a gift, but a flair for healing. Marian pushes away the shame she feels rising from her belly.

_She deserves it_, Marian tells herself. If only she could believe it.

"Duncan has given me a task; do you know the Warden named Alistair?"

"Oh, that one," Wynne says with a roll of her eyes. "You'll find him to the north, I believe. Follow the shouting."

Wynne refuses to elaborate, and a confused Marian picks up her pack and follows the path north to a small ramp. There aren't very many people around; a few elves are to the west, cleaning around a large table, and to the east is a small rotunda. There's no shouting, but there is a raised voice coming from the rotunda, and Marian heads for it.

There are two men there; one is berating at the other, who is waiting patiently for him to finish with a kind of calculated insolence. Marian recognizes the loud one as a mage, though she doesn't know his name; the other is a young man, about her age, wearing Grey Warden livery. She has no intention of getting between an angry mage and his target, so she leans against a handy bit of wall and waits for them to finish.

The mage storms off when he's done shouting, and Marian straightens when Alistair turns to her. He seems have shrugged off the confrontation as soon as it happened, a talent which Marian envies.

"You know, one good thing about the Blight is how it brings people together," he says, smirking.

"Are you Alistair?" Marian asks.

"That's me. You're... you're the Grey Warden recruit Duncan brought, aren't you?" Alistair frowns a bit, digging furrows in his brow.

Marian recognizes the signs of an inveterate forgetter of names and leaps to his rescue. "I'm Marian. Pleased to meet you."

"That was the name!" Alistair says, snapping his fingers. "Sorry, I'm – "

"Bad at names? No kidding," she says, a slow grin crossing her face. He seems like a friendly sort. "That mage wasn't interested in togetherness; if you'd been any closer, I'm pretty sure he would have fireballed himself to get away."

"Really? You think so?" Alistair asks, clearly pleased at the idea. "I'll have to keep that in mind." He looks her over, and when he sees the staff poking out from behind her shoulder, he winces. "I don't suppose you happen to be another mage?"

"What gave it away?" Marian slaps her staff with shocking disregard for its formidable offensive capabilities. She sends a sly look Alistair's way. "Would that make your day worse?"

"Hardly," he says, though he does look like he wishes he could hide behind his shield. "I just like to know my chances of being turned into a toad at any given moment."

Marian tilts her head, considering. "Fair to middling?"

"Good to know," he says, chuckling uneasily.

"Oh!" Marian exclaims. "Duncan wanted me to get you; he said it's time to summon the other recruits."

Alistair looks so relieved that she has to laugh. "Lead on, then," he says, and she does.

"So who was that man?" she asks him as they walk down the ramps toward the camp proper.

"Enchanter Rydell," Alistair says, grimacing. He has an expressive face; it's easy to tell what he's thinking. She keeps catching herself staring at him. "Cranky bugger, isn't he? The Revered Mother sent me to fetch him. I suppose he has reason to be put out that she sent me, though," he admits, watching her out of the corner of his eye. "It was a calculated kind of insult. I was once a templar."

Marian stops dead and whirls on him. "You're a _templar_?"

She thought she'd left templars behind forever. Was she never to be free of them? And for it to be _him_ – she'd liked him a moment ago, when he laughed at her jokes and treated her like a real person, not just a mage.

A new and more horrible thought strikes her – she'd heard in the Tower that mages who went outside the Tower are assigned their very own templars, who follow them around like mabari ready to strike.

Perhaps Duncan is more prepared for a mage recruit than he let on.

"Yes," Alistair says, pausing beside her. His face is faintly alarmed, and Marian starts working out the best way to petrify him – templars can't smite if they can't move, right? – and then make a break for the exit. It must show on her face, because he puts up his hands defensively. "Well, half a templar. Three-quarters? The point is, I never finished my training, I didn't want to be there in the first place, _please_ don't turn me into a toad."

Marian pauses in reaching for her staff. "What do you mean you didn't want to be there in the first place?"

Alistair hesitates and drops his hands, and Marian is sure that he's deciding how much to tell her; eventually he sighs. "Look, I was given to the Chantry a long time ago. I didn't exactly have a choice in the matter, and then when the Revered Mother decided I was to be a Templar... Well, it was better than the other options." He chuckles, though there's a grim edge to it Marian doesn't understand. "I meant it when I said I didn't want to be there, you know. When Duncan recruited me, it was the best day of my life."

Alistair spreads his arms in what looks to her like the beginning of a smite and Marian instinctively flinches, stepping backward quickly. Alistair freezes. "I'm not – " He sighs loudly, dropping his arms. His armor creaks in protest at his sudden movements. "I'm not a Templar anymore." He raps one gauntleted fist on his cuirass, where the Grey Warden griffons are emblazoned; Marian belatedly realizes that's what he'd been trying to do before. "I'm a Grey Warden," he says earnestly. "Maker willing, so will you be."

A slow flush of shame begins to work its way up her neck. She knows better than to believe that every templar is like the worst of them, but Marian has spent so long hating them and when finally she escapes, there is Alistair; how can anyone blame her for feeling trapped? But she is leaping to conclusions; she can at least wait until those conclusions are warranted. _Then_ she can fireball Alistair's head into paste and make her escape.

"I don't know a toad spell," Marian confesses.

"Thank the Maker," he says with a grin. "Porcupines? Cockroaches? Skunks? No?"

She returns his smile, trying to act like nothing has changed, then she turns and starts to walk again, leading the way although she doesn't know who she's looking for or where she's going; Alistair follows her without comment until she turns her head to look at him. "The templars took me away when I was little," she says, thinking of a tow-headed little boy with hazel eyes, alone in a little bed in an anonymous Chantry dormitory. "To be a mage at the Circle. I know what it's like not to have choices."

"Sounds like we both owe Duncan, then," Alistair says. He's not smiling, but his face is open and warm.

"You might be right," Marian allows.

She swoops in and rescues Daveth from the consequences of antagonizing women who wield swords, promises a magical blight-curing flower to the kennel-keeper, and disentangles Ser Jory from a Chantry service; Marian refuses the sister's blessing and walks away in the middle of her ranting. _The likes of me_, she fumes. _If I were the kind of mage you're so afraid of, I'd_...

And that stops her train of thought in its tracks, because they have every right to be afraid. Mages are more destructive than nature, than the worst of wild animals, than any of the sentient species, because they are all these things and more, and there will never be any way for her to put her magic down.

Chastened and silent, she follows Alistair to join Duncan and the other two recruits at his fire.

Duncan greets them with a smile. "You found Alistair, did you?"

"I followed the shouting," Marian says, looking at Alistair from the corner of her eye. He flushes a little. She debates asking Duncan about the conclusions she'd leapt to earlier, but it's not the time, not in front of the others.

"Good. I'll assume you're ready to begin preparations," Duncan says, then turns to Alistair, a sardonic eyebrow raised. "Assuming, of course, that you're quite finished riling up mages, Alistair."

Alistair returns an uneasy smile. "What can I say? The revered mother ambushed me. The way she wields guilt, they should stick her in the army."

"She forced you to sass the mage, did she?" Duncan sighs, in a way that makes Marian think he's done it before. Alistair must be something of a trial, and Daveth won't be any better. It makes her wonder why Duncan recruited them; Ser Jory seems the only sensible choice. "We cannot afford to antagonize anyone, Alistair," Duncan says. "We don't need to give anyone more ammunition against us."

"You're right, Duncan." Alistair takes a deep breath. "I... apologize." It sounds like something he's not used to doing very often.

Duncan smiles faintly, approvingly, and lets it go. "Now that you're all here, we can begin. You four will be heading into the Korcari Wilds to perform two tasks. The first is to obtain three vials of darkspawn blood, one for each recruit."

"Into the Wilds?" Daveth objects. "There's other things than darkspawn in there. There's witches, there's _the_ witch - the Witch of the Wilds."

"Are you refusing?" Duncan asks politely, but Marian freezes like a mouse that's seen a snake; there's something of a blade being drawn from its sheath in his voice, something she never, ever wants turned on her.

"N-no," Daveth says, uncertainly.

"Good." Duncan turns back to the rest of them. Daveth licks his lips, just once.

"Surely the army has already spilled enough darkspawn blood," Ser Jory says. "Is it truly necessary for us to collect more?"

"You must work together to collect the components. It's just as much a part of the Joining as what comes after," Duncan replies.

"What else do you need us to do?" Alistair asks.

"There was once a Grey Warden archive in the Wilds, abandoned long ago when we could no longer afford to maintain such remote outputs. It has recently come to our attention that some scrolls have been left behind, magically sealed to protect them. Alistair, I want you to retrieve these scrolls if you can."

"What if they're not there anymore?" Marian asks.

"It's possible the scrolls may have been destroyed or even stolen, though the seal's magic should have protected them. Only a Grey Warden can break such a seal."

Duncan sounds confident, but Marian can think of a dozen things that can go wrong even if they find the missing scrolls, and none of them are good. She's not even sure she wants to be a Warden, and all this seems like excellent reason to melt into the Wilds and start on her own quest to find her long-lost family. It's something that bears thinking about, in any case, and she may as well have a plan for fleeing, even if she never uses it.

"I don't understand," Alistair says, bewildered. "Why leave such things in a ruin if they're so valuable?"

"It was assumed we would someday return," Duncan says, a faint note of regret in his voice. "A great many things were assumed that have not held true."

"So, darkspawn blood and ancient scrolls?" Marian says.

Daveth sighs. "I suppose we'd better get to it before the light goes."

Duncan nods. "Alistair, watch over your charges. Return quickly, and safely."

Alistair nods in return, so serious that Marian could almost believe that his earlier foolishness was a dream. "We will."

"Then may the Maker watch over your path. I will see you when you return." Duncan turns back to his fire, dismissing them, and Alistair leads them to the barred gates that open out into the Wilds.


	8. The Wilds

They are attacked almost immediately upon leaving the gates, not by darkspawn, but by a large pack of wolves. Marian stays in the background as Alistair and Ser Jory draw sword and shield and Daveth moves to the mid-range between her and the other men, drawing his bow and nocking arrow to string.

Her only experience in fighting with swordsmen so far has been with Lily, back at the tower, and immediately it's clear that there's miles between her and the men in front of her. Alistair in particular is surprisingly lethal, but Ser Jory holds his own, swinging his greatsword in huge, powerful arcs to keep the wolves away from his undefended back while he takes on one wolf that's larger than the rest.

Marian starts there, freezing one wolf and setting another on fire; she's hoping it'll panic and run away or set the rest alight, but after her spell effect wears off, the fire flickers and dies quickly. _Lesson one: flesh doesn't burn_. The wolf is clearly injured, however, and Marian peppers it with arcane bolts until it falls. Alistair has already killed the one she froze and moved on.

At this range, she can watch the battle like a play, directing spells where they'll do the most good. It's easy to see when one of her fellow recruits is in trouble, or to take an opportunity to use one of her few spells that work on more than one creature at a time.

She casts cone of lightning at two wolves who have allowed themselves to be herded together. At the same time, Jory draws back from an overhand lunge to the alpha wolf's body, and he moves back into a ready position, which Marian realizes too late puts him directly in the path of her cone.

Jory screams, back arching and sightless eyes staring at the sky. He drops his sword. Marian pulls her magic back into her hands as fast as she can, wincing at the burn, but it's too late; Jory drops to the ground, boneless, and doesn't get up. She tosses a heal at him through smarting palms and freezes the last wolf in time for Alistair to shatter it with his shield.

"_Damn_ it!" Marian says, racing forward and dropping to her knees next to Jory with a thump. Alistair stabs one of the dead wolves in the head, making her jump, but he goes to the next and does the same, methodically going through all the dead bodies. _He's just making sure they're dead_, she tells herself, willing her racing heart to calm.

Jory is not dead, but unconscious; she doesn't know what he looked like before her off-the-cuff heal spell worked its magic, but the scales on his scalemail are smoking and charred, and the flesh on his neck is hot when she tests it with her hand. But he is still warm, even though he is not breathing, and she can't find any wounds on his exposed skin... Marian frowns and cups her hand, letting her magic run into it like a puddle. Daveth says something behind her, but he is easy to ignore. She wills it into lightning and when it has obeyed, she pours it onto Jory's chest, over his heart; it flows straight through his scalemail, through the thick weave of his gambeson and onto his skin. Jory's chest jumps up in the air like a thing possessed, but he still does not breathe. _Again_, she commands, and this time when the lightning strikes he gasps, his eyes flying open.

Marian sits back on her heels and allows herself to feel tired. After a minute, Jory's breathing regains a more normal rhythm and he struggles to sit up.

"What was _that_?" Daveth demands, his eyes wide.

Marian stands, brushing dirt off her robes. "What, saving his life?"

Alistair glances at her and then away, to Jory, who is examining his hands like he's never seen them before. He reaches down and pulls Jory to his feet. "Are you all right?"

"Yes," Ser Jory says, somewhat dazed.

Alistair cocks an eyebrow at Marian. "The Wardens frown on electrocuting your fellow recruit, just so you know," he says pleasantly.

Marian wants to make a face and taunt him a little, but this is not the wisecracking Alistair she'd met earlier; instead she turns to Ser Jory and apologizes.

After retrieving Ser Jory's sword, they press on into the Wilds. It's quieter than Marian expected, and Daveth seems to think so too, because he's looking around and frowning.

"Is that normal for wolves?" she asks. "I read that they don't normally come that close to people."

Daveth says, "Wolves behave differently in the Wilds."

"The Blight can change the way animals act," Alistair says. "They can catch the taint just the same as people, but there are visual signs in that case – they go all twisted and corrupted like people do. Or the darkspawn could be eating whatever the animals normally eat."

Marian feels a twist of pity knotting up her guts.

"I know," Alistair says in a lower voice, surprising her into looking up. She hadn't realized he'd dropped back to walk beside her. "But they attacked us. I wouldn't have killed them if I'd had a choice, and neither would you."

She smiles a little, a thank you, and he returns it in shared sympathy. They walk on through lush ground cover and along a small pond when Ser Jory shouts from the front. "Warden!"

Alistair breaks into a jog and leaves Marian to follow as best she can, cursing the mage robes she wears. Daveth and Ser Jory are crouched around a soldier wearing the king's standard, who lies directly in their path. There's a bloody trail crushed through the grass and plants that stretches as far as she can see; he's been crawling back to Ostagar for days, at a guess.

Marian can see his chest rise and fall, very weakly. "He's still breathing," she says, drawing her staff.

"Wardens?" the soldier gasps.

"Yes," Alistair says, crouching at his head. "You're right," he says to Marian. "He's not half as dead as he looks."

Marian lightly sets the butt of her staff on the soldier's back, over his heart, and casts the only healing spell she knows.

"They came out of the ground... " the soldier says, struggling up onto his hands and knees. Marian moves her staff with the man, doing her best to keep the weight of it off him; she's forcing pure magic into him, her best healing thoughts along with it. It's the best she can do without her standard healing spell. "My whole scouting unit, they're all gone. I've got to – I've got to get back to camp."

Alistair helps the soldier onto his feet, and Marian lets her staff drop. He seems stronger now, and limps away with only a little difficulty. The gates aren't far, and he'll be within shouting distance in a few minutes.

"Did you hear?" Ser Jory says, when the soldier is out of earshot. "An entire patrol of seasoned men killed by darkspawn!" His voice is perilously close to panic.

Marian will admit to having some of the same craven thoughts, but she's not fool enough to think that saying so out loud will somehow magically change what they have to do.

"We'll be fine if we're careful," Alistair says patiently.

"Those soldiers were careful, and they were still overwhelmed."

"How do you know that?" Marian asks.

Jory barrels on, ignoring her. "How many darkspawn can the four of us slay? A dozen? A hundred? And that's _if_ little miss there can correct her aim," he says, glaring at Marian. "There's an entire _army_ in these forests!"

"There are darkspawn about, but we're in no danger of walking into the bulk of the horde." There is less patience and more warning now.

"How do you know?" Jory keeps going with a tenacity that surprises Marian. "I'm not a coward, but this is foolish and reckless. We should go back."

"If you have to point out that you're not a coward, maybe you're doing something wrong," Daveth says, speaking with apparent unconcern to a nearby tree.

"Duncan knows what's out here," Marian says. "He said this is part of the Joining. Do you really want to go back empty-handed?"

"I know I don't," Daveth agrees.

"Know this: All Grey Wardens can sense darkspawn," Alistair says to Jory, soothing like he's a child. "Whatever their cunning, I guarantee they won't take us by surprise. That's why I'm here."

Marian rolls her eyes and turns away from the men, examining the edges of the small clearing. The Wilds were much greener than she expected from the ride in, lush with trees and smaller plants dotting the ground between ponds that range between ankle-deep and waist-high. They're on the edge of one of the ponds, and there's an old bit of ruined wall leaning over nearby.

Underneath is a tall flower, white with a red center, which looks exactly like the one the kennel-master asked her to search for. She plucks it, root ball and all, and wraps it in a spare cloth before stowing it in her pack.

"Picking flowers?" Alistair asks, leaning over her shoulder, and she nearly screams. She does jump and he backs away quickly, laughing. "Sorry, I couldn't help it."

Marian glares, but relents after a moment. "It's for that mabari," she explains, tossing her pack onto her back and standing. "What now?"

"Let's get a move on," Alistair suggests, and they follow him deeper into the Wilds.

The sun is setting when they find their first pack of darkspawn, noisily digging through what looks like a human campsite, complete with supplies and tents pitched in a convenient corner of Tevinter ruins. They take a precious second to coordinate strategy before the darkspawn notice them, but then the wind changes and one of the bigger ones raises its head, sniffing before its head snaps around and fixes on them. It screams in rage, calling the rest of the darkspawn.

Marian picks up her skirts and races forward before the darkspawn can spread out around them; she can hear the men following close behind her, and she skids to a stop when she judges she's just within range of her cone spells. She fries two short ones before they can react, and then Alistair is there with a bellow, cutting between her and the pack to draw them off. An arrow sings past her ear to lodge in a darkspawn's throat; it screams and flings itself at Marian, or maybe it's trying to get past her to Daveth, but Jory's there with a huge swing that starts somewhere over his head and ends chest-deep in the darkspawn.

Marian freezes the largest one to give Alistair, who is fighting it and two other short ones, some breathing room, and turns to take on one of the archers, which is hiding amongst the ruins. She takes an unnecessarily long time to deal with it, and when she turns back, Daveth is a whirl of long knives defending Alistair, who is dripping blood from his side and fending off the big one she'd frozen before.

_Lesson two: frost spells wear off_, she thinks, furious with herself. She bats a heal spell at Alistair and a directed lightning strike at the large darkspawn. Jory looks back from the other side of the clearing, where he's been fighting the other archer; he curses and starts to jog back, but Alistair surprises them all with a sudden, explosive lunge, burying his sword in the darkspawn giant's face.

The giant falls backwards, and Alistair lets go of his sword, but it might have been the only thing holding him up, because he falls backward. He lets out a giant breath, or maybe he knocks all the air out of his lungs, it's impossible to be sure. She's by his side in a second, but he flaps his hands at her, even though he doesn't seem to be breathing.

"Fine," he croaks. He pushes her at Daveth, but when she turns her head Daveth is burying his daggers in the darkspawn's spine, and it goes down.

"He doesn't need help," Marian says, turning back to Alistair. "You do." For a second, she wishes Wynne were here – healing is decidedly not her specialty, and that seems to be all she's doing! – but then she puts that aside. With gentle fingers she peels apart the leather brigandine Alistair wears under his cuirass, only to find a longish scratch, lazily seeping blood. The skin and leather around her fingers are saturated in blood; she must have already healed his wound.

"It's nothing," she says to Alistair, smiling. "It's almost healed." She lays a hand on his cuirass, pushing out with her magic the way Wynne taught her, and probes his lungs; they're fine as well, and he's done no injury to his back.

"Just catch your breath," she says, leaning over him. "You're fine."

"They're all dead," Daveth adds, standing while he cleans his daggers. He puts them back in their sheaths while Marian watches, fascinated; she can't believe she didn't notice them earlier, but when they're fully engaged with the sheaths, they practically disappear behind the leather straps.

"There's more to you than meets the eye," she says to Daveth.

He winks at her and stoops down to retrieve his bow. She laughs and looks back down at Alistair, who looks a little disconcerted. "What? He saved your life."

Alistair shakes his head and cranes his head to check for Jory.

A little while later, Alistair can speak in more than one word sentences and levers himself up off the ground, ignoring Jory's offered hand. "You should collect your vials," he says, and Marian could smack herself for forgetting. "There should be enough here for all three of you."

Alistair shows them how to slit the darkspawns' throats down the artery instead of along it, and how to scrape up the blood with the lip of the vial to avoid getting it on their hands. He folds one of the darkspawn up to force the blood to flow more quickly for Marian, who he insists should wash her hands as soon as possible.

"It's just blood," she says blankly. It's not the first time she's had blood on her hands, and what that says for life at the Tower she doesn't know.

"Maybe I don't want you wandering around with my blood on your hands," he says, stubborn, and she shuts up and scrubs her hands in the cold, cold water of a nearby pond until Alistair is satisfied.

"So where are these ancient Warden scrolls?" Daveth asks when they all have their vials stowed.

"South," Alistair answers, gesturing in what is presumably a southerly direction. Marian doesn't know how he can tell, since it's full night now, but she's willing to believe if it'll get them back to Ostagar faster. The Wilds are terrifyingly dark, and while it's mostly quiet, there are still nature sounds when she least expects them. The hairs on the back of her neck are standing at attention, like something is watching them.

They walk in a single-file line with Alistair in the lead and Jory bringing up the rear. The view is stunningly beautiful, actually, and Marian is distantly saddened at the idea of a darkspawn horde swarming over the Wilds and tainting everything they touch.

For the first time, she entertains the idea that being a Warden might be something to be proud of, rather than a means of escape or something to be escaped from. She has no plans for her life, other than to find her family; she may as well do something worth doing.

The decision calms a part of her that she hadn't realized was upset.

"Darkspawn ahead," Alistair hisses from the front. Marian snatches her staff off her back and shields herself with a quick gesture. She and Jory creep forward to join the other two, and Alistair points out into the deepening gloom to a bridge just at the edge of the light.

There's a darkspawn on the bridge, even bigger than the one Alistair took down at the last camp, with strange horns on its head. "What is _that_?" she gasps, then clamps a hand over her mouth.

Alistair sends her a warning glance, but answers anyway. "It's a Hurlock Emissary," he says, peering out into the night. "They use magic. That's your target, Marian – leave the rest to us." He gathers Jory and Daveth with a glance, and they nod, following his lead.

He counts off three beats while Marian feverishly arranges and rearranges her spells into a chain that takes advantage of spell effects and side effects; but that's all the time she has to think before Alistair gets to the end of his count and takes off, the other two following close behind. Marian stomps out the first beat of the cold spell she favors above all else, freezing the Emissary; she sprays it with bolts while the effect lasts, but all too soon it turns and flees to the other side of the bridge, disappearing into the night.

Marian licks her lips, glancing at the men; they're putting down their targets with efficiency, but they're not done yet. Venturing onto the other side of the bridge, where the emissary obviously felt safe, is a fool's gesture, but she'll never get a better chance to kill it. If she gives the thing time to heal itself...

She picks up her skirts and runs for the bridge before she can change her mind.

Alistair shouts at her, but she blocks his voice from her ears as she runs over the bridge. When she gets to the other side, she tosses a light wisp up into the air, illuminating two large darkspawn with bows, both drawing on her... and her target, the emissary, which has stopped thirty feet away and turned back to confront her with the advantage of numbers.

She gives thought to her shield, hoping to give it an extra charge, then forgets it and the archers on either side of her. Marian fires a long, thick strand of lightning at the emissary, who counters with a sickly green ball of energy, knocking her back a step. She snarls and fires bolt after bolt, refusing to let up even when the emissary returns each shot with that green energy, though she can feel herself starting to go light-headed. She glances down at herself only to see blood dripping from the points of her elbows and pooling under her feet; there is an arrow lodged in her thigh and one in her shoulder.

_Huh_, she thinks. Then she forgets it and pulls on her connection to the Fade, pulls as hard as she can and sends a wave of pure magical energy out of her hands, screaming with the effort. The world fades around the edges, going colorless and pale, but she can hear the others butchering darkspawn all around her.

She hopes she got the emissary, because she's having a hard time standing up. Marian leans on her staff, planting it in the ground.

"Marian!" Alistair takes her elbows and helps her stand.

"There's an arrow here – "

"And here. How did she _do_ that?"

"I don't know. She's lost too much blood."

"I have some potions I nicked off the quartermaster." Someone tips her head back and forces her mouth open; when she tastes the foul muskiness that means medicine, she swallows as much as she can, and after a second she can swallow the rest of it. Her eyes are closed, she realizes, and opens them again.

"Marian?" Alistair asks, all anxiety. He still has her elbows in his hands. "Can you hear me?"

She nods with an effort. "Another," she whispers. "But take out the arrows first."

They lay her down on the ground and Daveth puts a leather strap between her teeth. "Scream if you want," he says, eyes wide. "We won't tell."

She has no intention of screaming – she knows that promise isn't worth the paper it's printed on – but when Alistair cuts the arrow out of her thigh, the pain is so overwhelming that when she comes back to herself she realizes that she's been screaming quite without her permission.

"Sorry," Alistair whispers when he moves to her shoulder. "I'm sorry."

Marian shakes her head. The pain is worse when he cuts around the arrowhead in her shoulder; it feels deeper. She is away from herself for longer this time, and she barely notices when Daveth takes the leather out of her mouth. She swallows some healing potion when they pour it down her throat. It doesn't help the lingering pain, but it does mostly close her wounds; she could do the rest if she had any magic left over at all.

She pushes herself up into a sitting position, and immediately folds over, curling herself around everything that's wrong with her right now; the pain fades gradually, and she unfolds herself to find all three men staring at her.

"Don't happen to have a lyrium potion, do you?" she asks Daveth with a weary half-smile. She doesn't actually expect an answer, but he digs a hand into his pack and comes out with a very small vial that glows blue in the darkness. He hands it to her silently. "You're a wonder," she says, toasting him with the vial before tossing it down.

The empty hole in her mind heals itself over with nary a trace and she sighs, relieved. "Maker, that's a weird feeling," she says, and levers herself up with her staff. She casts a healing spell on herself and the last of the wounds disappears without a scar.

"What were you _thinking_?" Alistair explodes.

Marian is feeling a little hazy. "What?"

"There could have been an army of darkspawn here," Alistair says angrily. "You didn't know, because you didn't _check with the Grey Warden_."

"The bards love to sing of a single hero storming the castle," Daveth adds, stooping to casually loot one of the darkspawn wearing clothes. "Of course, normally the hero dies in those."

"And you know better than to draw that deeply on the Fade," Alistair continues, as if Daveth hasn't spoken. "You know what waits for you there."

He's worried as well as angry, Marian realizes, and sighs. "All right," she says. "All right, I get it, I'll be more careful."

"Good," Alistair says, and looks like he's sort of surprised at himself. "We should... we should go," he says, looking around. Her light faded when her magic ran out, and the moon has yet to come up, so all she can see is what's illuminated by the darkspawn torches. Daveth is picking over the bodies and the darkspawn encampment; she knows she should join him if she wants to trade with the quartermaster at Ostagar, but the idea is frankly disgusting. She sighs and finally moves, following Alistair through the camp. They've started moving more east than south; Marian truly hopes that Alistair knows where he's going.

Daveth comes up beside her and slips something into her hand, winks, and joins Alistair in the front. Daveth has stolen the darkspawn torches, which is a thoroughly good idea if they want the entire horde to see them coming, but Alistair takes one anyway. Marian rolls her eyes and finally looks down to see what Daveth gave her: two little lyrium potions and a healing potion. She laughs and puts them in her pockets, healing on the right and lyrium on the left. _Lesson three: thieves are handy_.

They turn north again once they're past the larger lake that divides this region of the Wilds, and soon their path leads up a softly sloping hill. There are more ruins in this area, and Marian thinks they must be close to the old tower, or at least she hopes they are; she is tired and hungry and more than ready to find a bedroll and fall into it.

Naturally, that's when they run into another group of darkspawn, led by something Alistair calls a Hurlock alpha. That makes the tall ones hurlocks, she reasons as she draws her staff, and the short ones... well, she'll have to ask Alistair later.

They all escape nearly dying this time, and afterward Alistair points out that it was Daveth's turn, and how like a rogue it is to welsh.

Marian rolls her eyes and steps past the men to walk into the ruined tower. It's built on the same scale as Ostagar, with huge, open arches and tall windows overlooking the valley. She tosses up her little light wisp again, but the tower is empty, overgrown, and deserted.

There's a shattered chest across from the door, and Marian walks over to it, but she already knows that the scrolls are gone.

"Well, well, what have we here?" a voice says behind her, and Marian spins, her hand already halfway to her staff. The woman standing on the ramp opposite is nothing like anything she's seen before; she's wild and dramatic and baring much more skin than Marian thinks wise in Ferelden's spring chill. "Are you a vulture, I wonder? A scavenger poking amidst a corpse whose bones were long since cleaned?" Marian can feel the magic in her; it burns so bright that she wonders why the others can't feel it, too. The wilder reaches the bottom of the ramp and pauses, assessing them with cool eyes. "Or merely an intruder, come into these darkspawn-filled Wilds of mine in search of easy prey?"

Marian brushes past the men, who still gawk at the wilder like children – it's entirely possible none of them have ever seen that much naked female flesh in their lives, a snide part of her remarks – and stops short when the other woman pins her with her eyes. "What say you, hmm? Scavenger or intruder?"

"Neither," Marian says, narrowing her eyes. "This tower was once the Grey Wardens'." Then she remembers that Alistair is the only legitimate Warden among them; she looks back guiltily, but he bows at the waist, just the smallest fraction, and gestures with his right arm in the courtly gesture for _go ahead_. She smiles, although she's a little startled by his fine manners, and turns back to the witch.

"'Tis a tower no longer. The Wilds have obviously claimed this desiccated corpse." The wilder starts moving again, a purposeful stroll across the tower ruins to the other side. "I have watched your progress for some time. 'Where do they go,' I wondered, 'why are they here?'" She turns, framed by the night at her back. Her eyes are bright with pleasure and curiosity. "And now you disturb ashes none have touched for so long. Why is that?"

"Don't answer that," Alistair warns under his breath, coming to stand beside her. "She looks Chasind, and that means others may be nearby."

She laughs, scornful. "You fear barbarians will swoop down upon you?"

"Yes, swooping is bad," Alistair says with a sneer.

"She's a Witch of the Wilds, she is!" Daveth hisses from Marian's other side. "She'll turn us into toads!"

"Witch of the Wilds?" She snorts. "Such idle fancies, those legends. Have you no minds of your own? You there," she says to Marian. "Women do not frighten like little boys. Tell me your name and I shall tell you mine."

"I'm Marian," she says after an uncertain moment.

The witch smiles, wickedly amused. "And you may call me Morrigan, if you wish. Shall I guess your purpose? You sought something in that chest, something that is here no longer?"

"'Here no longer?' You stole them, didn't you? You're... some kind of... sneaky... witch-thief!" Alistair sputters indignantly.

Morrigan raises a delicately plucked eyebrow. "How very eloquent," she says to Alistair, like she's talking to a child. "Tell me, how does one steal from dead men?"

"Quite easily, it seems," Alistair says, indignant and injured, ignoring Marian's hissed warnings to stop. "Those documents are Grey Warden property, and I suggest you return them."

Morrigan folds her arms and looks down her long nose at Alistair. "I will not, for 'twas not I who removed them. Invoke a name that means nothing here any longer if you wish; I am not threatened."

Marian lays her hand on Alistair's arm, silencing him, before she asks, "Then who _did_ remove them?" She can't believe Alistair can't feel the power rolling off Morrigan in waves, growing hotter and hotter the more he irritates her – they must train templars in how to irritate mages, she thinks, gritting her teeth and digging her fingers into his forearm.

He shakes her hand off, but holds his tongue. _Good enough_.

"'Twas my mother, in fact," Morrigan says.

"Will you take us to her?" Marian asks.

Morrigan laughs. "There is a sensible request. I like you."

"I'd be careful," Alistair says, louder than he has to. Marian winces and turns on him, but he's clearly in no mood to be quieted now. "First it's," and his voice squeaks into a hideous falsetto imitation of Morrigan's voice, "'I like you...' but then 'Zap!' Frog time."

"What is with you and frogs?" Marian mutters. "Shut up, or _I'll_ turn you into one."

"She'll put us all in the pot, she will," Daveth says, fear in his voice.

"If the pot's warmer than this forest, it'll be a nice change," Jory says, and Marian thanks the Maker that his faint heart seems to be absent for the moment. At least one of them has some sense.

It doesn't hurt that he's right; it's colder than a witches' tit and she'd quite like to get back to Ostagar before morning breaks.

Morrigan's smile tilts lopsidedly, edging into a smirk. "Follow me, then, if it pleases you," she says, turning and disappearing into the night. Marian takes a breath, then another, and follows, the other three behind her.

Marian loses sight of Morrigan every time she takes her eyes off of her, but the ground is so rough that she has no choice but to pick her footing nearly every step of the way. Morrigan makes exasperated sounds when she has to wait for them, and eventually she throws up her own light spell to join Marian's. It helps.

After what feels like forever but is more likely three-quarters of an hour, Morrigan makes a satisfied noise in her throat and bounds forward like a deer. The loss of her light is annoying, but now Marian can see where she's headed, an old, dilapidated hut surrounded by the ever-present lakes.

An old woman waits for them in the light of a torch planted in the ground. She dresses plainly, in every way an unremarkable old woman... but the Veil is thin here, thinnest where the old woman stands, waiting patiently for them. She's never felt anything like it before.

"I see them, girl," the old woman says as they stop before her. She looks each of them up and down, lifting her brows a little at Marian's Circle robes, before nodding. "Much as I expected."

She watches the old woman like a small and trembling thing in the presence of a snake, never knowing when she might strike; the others squabble amongst themselves, and she waits.

"And do you believe as these boys do?" Morrigan's mother asks her, watching her in return with eyes the color of old amber, identical to Morrigan's.

"I don't know what to believe," Marian says, and it is the truth. There are so many questions she wants to ask, but for the first time in her life, she thinks it might be better to keep them behind her teeth.

The old woman laughs, her eyes knowing. "A statement that possesses more wisdom than it implies. Be always aware... or is it oblivious? I can never remember."

"Do you have the treaties?" Marian asks before she can say anything else. She wants to be as far away from here as possible, away from the wilder witch and her mother, who is so alien that Marian doesn't know what to think.

The old woman smirks and turns, lifting a cloth bag from the ground and handing it to her. Marian touches the side; she can feel the ends of at least two wooden scroll rods. "Thank you for returning them," she says carefully, politely.

"Such manners!" Morrigan's mother says with a laugh. "Always in the last place you look. Like stockings!" She fixes Marian with her eyes, and says in a more serious tone, "Take them to your Grey Wardens. Tell them this Blight's threat is greater than they realize!"

"What do you mean?" Marian asks, confused.

"Either the threat is more or they realize less. Or perhaps the threat is nothing!" the woman muses. "Or perhaps they realize nothing!" She laughs, a long, drawn-out cackle. "Oh, do not mind me. You have what you came for."

"Time for you to go, then," Morrigan says pointedly.

"Do not be ridiculous, girl. These are your guests." It's an order, with teeth, and from the way Morrigan rolls her eyes, not a very welcome one. Marian is too tired and too glad to get away from such a powerful enigma to care about Morrigan's feelings.

Morrigan sighs. "Oh, very well. I will show you out of the woods. Follow me."


	9. The Joining

Morrigan leads them to Ostagar's gates and then leaves them, deflecting Marian's thanks with brusque words and disappearing. Marian shrugs and pounds on the gates until the sentry lets them in. He can't tell her what time it is, only that it's third watch, which spans the first half of the night, but he says he expects to be relieved soon.

Marian looks longingly at the food tent, far in the distance, but turns and trudges over to Duncan's fire with a sigh.

Duncan stands at his bonfire, staring into its depths. "Here," she says abruptly, holding out the sack of scrolls. She doesn't care if she's interrupting his private meditations; it's late, she's tired and hungry and cranky.

Duncan turns with an easy smile. "You were successful, then? Good. I've had the Circle mages preparing. With the blood you've retrieved, we can begin the Joining immediately."

This sets her mind buzzing. The Joining is a magical ritual, then? She wishes she knew anything about the magical properties of darkspawn blood; without knowing, she can't guess at its purpose. Rodercom's Uncommon Calling has a section on magnifying rituals, and she has wondered if painting the sigils in blood might magnify the effect. Alistair mentioned that all Wardens can sense the darkspawn when they're nearby – obviously a magically instilled talent. Perhaps the darkspawn blood is used as a focus? _Eshaba,_ in particular, is sensitive to its conducting material, and it's easily linked to a subject, but how do they invert its inherent desire to throw energy outward?

Marian theorizes happily, cursing her lack of reference materials, until she realizes that the hum of conversation has stopped. She looks up. They're staring at her, and Duncan looks both expectant and gently amused; she realizes that she has just drifted away from a somewhat important conversation, and that perhaps inattention due to the library in her mind might not be as easily explained or excused here as it is at the Tower.

"Sorry," she forces herself to say, hating every moment of it. "Could you repeat the question?"

"Are you ready for the Joining?" Duncan asks, all amusement banished like it's never existed.

"Oh," Marian temporizes, glancing longingly at the army camp she knows is in the distance, where the food and bathing tents are. "You couldn't give us half an hour, could you?" She brightens as she remembers what's in her pack, and that it gives her a legitimate reason for delay. "I have something for the kennel-master."

Something chills deep in Duncan's eyes, and Marian opens her mouth to take back her request, but he surprises her by nodding. "Best you finish anything left outstanding," he says. Alistair's eyes flicker toward Duncan and then away, so quickly Marian almost misses it; but there's a crease between his brows that wasn't there before.

_Trouble's coming_. But without knowing from where, or who, all Marian can do is keep her eyes open.

They break from Duncan's fire and Marian immediately steps over to the kennel. "I brought you something," she says to the kennel-master with a smile, digging in her pack. "I'm pretty sure this is the one you wanted..." She liberates the flower and rolls her eyes when she realizes that it's showered dirt over everything in her pack.

"Let me see that," the kennel-master says, his eyes intent. He gently smooths out a twisted petal, tracing its blood-red base, and smells the center. "That's exactly it," he says with a grin. "Wonderful! Hold on for a minute while I mash it?" He steps away before Marian can point out that it's the middle of the night and she has other things to do.

"Of course I'll wait," she says to empty space.

"Aren't you done yet?" Alistair asks from behind her, and she swallows her breath while simultaneously twisting to look at him and launches into a coughing fit.

"Would you _quit_ that?" Marian asks when she finally has her breath back. "Maker, you're irritating."

"All part of the service," Alistair says blandly, but the gleam in his eye speaks for him. Then he sobers. "But really, we should get moving. Duncan's waiting."

"I know," she says. "But..."

"Thanks for waiting," the kennel-master says, appearing as abruptly as he'd disappeared with a potion pot in his hand. "Mind giving me a hand? I need a Grey Warden for this part."

"I'm not a Grey Warden yet," Marian says, shrinking backward a little. "He is." She jerks her thumb at Alistair.

"Oh no," Alistair says, outright backing away. "Dogs and I don't get along. You do it, if you're so eager. Leave me out of it."

The kennel-master sighs. "I hate to ask, but otherwise I'll have to put him down."

Marian groans and surrenders. "Hold this," she says to Alistair, dumping her pack on him and turning away before he can answer. "What do you need?"

She ends up muzzling a mabari that comes up to her waist while the kennel-master smears flower paste into its wounds. She decides to put something nasty in Alistair's bedroll at the next opportunity.

"That should do it," the kennel-master says. "I have to say, he's behaved nicely for you. Ever think about trying to imprint a mabari? I think this one'd suit you."

"Um," Marian says, taken aback. She backs out of the stall and accepts her pack from Alistair. "No? I've never had a pet, I'm not sure I could take care of one."

The kennel-master laughs scornfully. "A mabari takes care of itself," he tells her. "Come back after the battle, maybe we can see about imprinting him on you."

She agrees because Alistair is now poking her in the back to move her along. "_Quit_ it!" she hisses as soon as the mabari keeper is out of earshot. "What are you, twelve?"

"Duncan's waiting," is all he says in return, pointing toward the north.

"I was hoping for some food," she tells him, wistful longing spreading through her.

"Better not," Alistair says, warning.

"Really?" she says. Some rituals can have that effect, she knows, but even knowing she might be bringing it back up in twenty minutes time doesn't quell the desire. "What about water?"

He silently unhooks his water skin from his pack and passes it over. She's never drunk from a skin before, but after a minute she figures out the mechanics, and takes a swallow, or maybe two, before handing it back. "Thank you," she says, but he doesn't answer. Marian starts walking.

Alistair leads her to the same rotunda she met him in earlier. Jory and Daveth are waiting, and she takes her place in the loose circle they form when Alistair stops. Marian glances around, but there is nothing in this bare place except a low table with a large silver chalice. A ritual compacted into a potion? Could it be done?

Marian carefully banks that thought before she drifts off again.

She looks up, and Daveth catches her eye. He tosses her a tiny bag, which, when she looks down, proves to be a coin-purse. She looks at Daveth in confusion.

"The quartermaster was still awake," he says with a shrug. "He pays good coin for some of that stuff from the Wilds, and that's your share." He tosses identical bags to Jory and Alistair, who only catches it after it hits his breastplate. He nods to Daveth and folds his arms; this is a more serious Alistair than she's seen before. It's a little disconcerting.

Jory starts to pace, adding to the tension. Marian wishes he'd just stay still; if she has to with his fidgeting through the whole ritual, she's going to scream.

Daveth kicks a loose stone at Jory, and he stops. "The more I hear about this Joining, the less I like it," Jory says, and Marian groans. The way he flip-flops between courage and weakness is driving her insane.

"Are you blubbering again?" Daveth says, disgusted.

"Why all these damned tests? Have I not earned my place?"

"Maybe it's tradition. Maybe they're just trying to annoy you." Marian knows which one she'd rather believe, and from his voice, so does Daveth.

If she had worlds enough and time, she'd spell his voice silent or his mouth shut. He's giving himself more nerves with his own talking and reminding her of her own, which she had successfully pushed away. Rituals are dangerous, after all, and something about Duncan and Alistair's demeanor is setting off warning signals in her brain. Just did she miss at Duncan's fire?

"Look, there's nothing we can do about it now," she says to Jory. "Unless you want to run, in which case I'm pretty sure Duncan would find you."

Jory sighs. "I only know that my wife is in Highever with a child on the way. If they had warned me... it just doesn't seem fair."

Marian's nerves are multiplying, filling her up until she feels like a glass with too much ice inside. She looks at Alistair, who is studiously ignoring all three of them, his head turned to watch the entrance to the rotunda.

"Would you have come if they'd warned you? Maybe that's why they don't. The Wardens do what they must, right?"

"Including sacrificing us?" Marian's head comes around so fast her neck hurts. She tries to speak, but her voice has temporarily deserted her.

Daveth shrugs. "I'd sacrifice a lot more if I knew it would end the Blight."

Marian finds her voice. "Shut it, both of you!" She looks at Alistair again, whose shoulders seem to be climbing into his ears.

"Alistair?" She doesn't know what she wants him to say; she can hear Daveth and Jory continuing their bickering in softer tones, but Alistair won't even look at her.

She has no idea what's going on.

"_Duncan_," Alistair says in relief, dropping his shoulders and letting his arms unfold. Marian turns to Duncan who pauses, silhouetted in the frame of the empty doorway. He nods to Alistair, who nods back.

He crosses to the low table and turns to stand before it. "At last we come to the Joining," he says. He looks at each of them in turn with serious eyes; the world outside has gone away, the warm people sounds from the army camp, the small animal noises from the Wilds, the wind in the trees and the wet smell of nearing dawn. Jory and Daveth stand with her, scared and unsure.

"The Grey Wardens were founded during the first Blight, when humanity stood on the verge of annihilation," Duncan says, so solemn. "So it was that the first Grey Wardens drank of darkspawn blood... and mastered their taint."

Marian stares at the chalice with horror and sudden nausea. No wonder Alistair had warned her not to eat anything; she wonders if she'll bring it right back up, and if she'll still be counted a Warden if she does. Maybe they'll decide she's not fit after all, and send her back to the Tower...

Marian swallows, and swallows again to make sure it sticks. She won't go back, not ever. She'd rather die. If this is what it takes to make that happen, then she'll do it.

That doesn't mean she has to like it, or make too much of an effort not to vomit on Alistair's boots.

"We're... going to drink the blood of those... those _creatures_?" Jory probably thinks he's speaking under his breath, but it echoes in the empty space of the rotunda, bouncing off the stone walls. She winces.

Duncan nods. "As the first Grey Wardens did before us, as we did before you. _This_ is the source of our power and our victory."

"Those who survive the Joining become immune to the taint," Alistair says, shifting a little in place; Marian can hear his armor creaking. "We can sense it in the darkspawn and use it to slay the archdemon."

Duncan speaks again, his words measured and paced, almost ceremonious. "We speak only a few words prior to the Joining, but these words have been said since the first. Alistair, if you would?"

Marian wonders how many people have heard these words, and for how many they were the last words they'd ever hear.

"Join us, brothers and sisters. Join us in the shadows where we stand, vigilant. Join us as we carry the duty that cannot be forsworn. And should you perish, know that your sacrifice will not be forgotten and that one day..." His voice drops. "We shall join you."

Marian's breath comes slow and shaky. If their aim is to scare them with all this ceremony, then they've succeeded.

Duncan turns and gently picks up the chalice. "Daveth," he says with grave eyes. "Step forward."

Daveth takes the chalice and, hesitating only for a moment, drinks deeply. She can see his throat moving as he swallows and then hands the chalice back to Duncan. He goes a little pale, a green that does not sit well on his complexion, and rocks on his feet. Duncan backs away, watching Daveth as intently as the rest of them.

Abruptly Daveth staggers backward, his breathing coming harsh and jagged in the silence. He screams, holding his head, but even that doesn't break the spell they've been put under, and no one tries to help him. He struggles to lift his head, looking at Duncan, then collapses to his hands and knees. His breathing has stopped, and he holds his throat as if he is choking.

Only then does Marian go for her staff, but Alistair takes her arm before she can reach it. When she looks at him, he only shakes his head warningly. He's not even looking at her. Reluctantly, she lets her hand drop, and he lets her go.

Daveth falls. Neither Duncan nor Alistair check him, or try to help; that can only mean that there is no help possible, that he's... Marian bites her lip until it bleeds.

She's never seen anyone die before.

"Maker's breath!" Jory says, horror-struck.

"I am sorry, Daveth," Duncan says, and the insane thing is that he really does sound deeply sorry.

The terror is a real thing living inside her now, instead of a part of her; it continues to grow until she's just a vessel for a seething and roiling ocean of fear filling her up.

_Little mage, little mage_... something whispers in her ear. She gasps and then covers her mouth; of all things, she doesn't want them noticing_ this_, not when she's still not sure how much of a templar Alistair really is. _Little mage, do you want to die?_

In the abstract, she can admire its timing. This is the most vulnerable she's ever been.

_Little mage_, the demon whispers. _They could not defeat us, not you and me together._

She knows it's true; an abomination with her body would be a fearsome thing. But it wouldn't be her. For all that she's so scared of the Joining she's going to embarrass herself any moment now, at least if she dies, she will be her own self while doing it.

_I could give you anything_, it coaxes. _Your family. Your friend. You would never be weak again_.

She closes her mind as firmly as she dares. She will not give in to her fear. _My magic serves what is best in me_.

Duncan sighs, and something in it is bone-deep weariness; she suddenly wonders how many Joinings he has presided over, and how many recruits he has seen fall. A momentary, not entirely welcome wave of empathy sweeps over her, drowning out the demon's sweet murmuring.

He lifts his head, and offers the chalice to Jory. "Step forward, Jory."

"But..." Jory looks again at Daveth, dead on the ground. "I have a wife. A child!" He takes a step back, and then another; he is close to the wall now, and he draws his sword from its sheath. "Had I known..."

Marian knows exactly what he's feeling, but she would not have chosen to draw on Duncan, whatever the circumstances. Duncan's eyes narrow.

"There is no turning back," Duncan warns.

Jory shakes his head, fear alive in his voice. "No! You ask too much!" He brings his sword up defensively. "There is no glory in this!"

Duncan gently sets the chalice down on the table and draws a little poignard from his belt, barely a handspan long and wickedly sharp. He advances on Jory, implacable, a juggernaut; Jory swings at him with shaking hands. Duncan dodges the first swing, deflects the second, and then he's inside Jory's guard, burying the poignard in Jory's sternum with a flick of the wrist that drives it straight through his scalemail.

Marian has both hands over her mouth. She's not sure what will come out if she drops them, so she doesn't.

Duncan supports Jory's weight for a long moment, then rips the dagger out of his chest and steps back, allowing him to fall.

Then Duncan turns to her, a heavy weight in his eyes. "But the Joining is not yet complete." He holds the chalice out to her.

_Little mage_... the demon whispers, urgent now. _Do you want to die?_

_I'd rather die than be like you_, Marian answers, and takes the chalice.

The smell of blood and rot hits her first, and she swallows hard to keep from vomiting; then she pinches her nose and drinks down as much as she can bear before she hands it back to Duncan.

The blood leaves a thick, gelatinous coating on her tongue and throat, and she swallows several times to try and get rid of it, but it lingers, tasting of rot and waste and disease.

_I can still burn it out of you_, the demon tells her, but she's not listening anymore, preoccupied with the distant changes she can sense in her body. Her blood is heating up, turning to fire in her veins, and there's an overwhelming sharp, stabbing pain in her head. She clutches her head in both hands – it _hurts_ –

She screams, or she tries to, but she's curiously unconnected to her body; she can hear and see and feel, but she cannot move.

Something seizes her mind and abruptly rips it away from her body, flinging her into the Fade. Her mind is full of her own screaming, but with a deep breath she decides she can move again.

Then she looks up.

And up. And up.

The dragon screams defiance at her, and she just stands there, hands over her ears, too shocked to do anything or even move. It's huge and grossly corrupted, twisted beyond nature, but still she can feel a subtle, languorous song coming from the beast, softly beckoning to her. She sways on her feet, torn between the music calling to a part of her soul she hadn't known existed and the plain and simple fact that approaching any kind of beast that size is suicide.

It screams again, challenging her, but she clenches her teeth and pushes her hands harder against her ears. It doesn't block out the music, which she seems to be hearing through her very skin, but her nails digging into her skin is at least distracting.

She squeezes her eyes tightly shut, and it is only when she notices that she can't feel her fingernails in her scalp anymore that she realizes she has left the Fade. She's lying on the ground; Duncan and Alistair are leaning over her when she opens her eyes, and they both smile. "It is finished," Duncan says. "Welcome."

She sits up, and immediately regrets it; she presses her hands to her head and casts a healing spell, sighing in relief as the magic soothes all her irritated nerves.

Alistair stands back, giving her room. "Two more deaths. In my Joining, only one of us died, but it was..." He hesitates, and she can only imagine that he's searching for the words to describe the same thing that happened to Daveth. "It was horrible. I'm glad at least one of you made it through."

_So am I_. Marian pushes herself up off the ground and wavers only a little on her feet before finding her balance. It's been a long, hard, bloody day, and suddenly she is _starving_.

"How do you feel?" Duncan asks, his dark eyes unreadable.

"Like someone threw me off the Tower," she answers, lifting a hand to touch her head but thinking better of it when her head throbs. "And then landed on me."

"Such is what it takes to be a Grey Warden," Duncan says, but at least he sounds like he understands. It's nice to know that the person who would have murdered her without a second thought knows how she feels.

Maybe she's a little bitter.

"It's late," Duncan says. "Alistair will show you where you can sleep; tomorrow morning I'd like you to accompany me to a meeting with the king."

Startled, she agrees without question and regrets it almost immediately, but Alistair is beckoning her from the doorway and she reluctantly follows. "Why does he want me to go to the meeting?" she asks him. They head down the ever-present ramps.

"Now that you're here, you're the low man on the pole," Alistair says, almost with glee. "You're in for some great fun – running messages, taking dictation, and oh! Going to _strategy meetings_ with good King Cailan." The sarcasm in his voice is so thick it practically chokes her.

"I could really learn to hate you," Marian says.

He laughs and leads her to a tiny tent pitched at the edge of the camp, points out the food and bathing tents, and mercifully leaves her alone. She is so tired that she collapses on the bedroll inside without even taking her hair down, but she can't sleep. She replays Daveth and Jory's deaths over and over in her mind. Could she have stopped it? She's not sure, but she could have at least tried.

She has enormous misgivings about what she's just done, but she can't see any way out of it except forward. She's a Grey Warden now, and there's a Blight to be fought. Fine. Now, if only she had the slightest idea _how_...

Decision made, Marian falls asleep between one breath and the next. She walks the pathways of the Fade alone, and tonight her dreams are her own.


	10. The Tower

Marian wakes on her own for the first time in over a week. For a moment she thinks about reveling in this unexpected treat and going back to sleep, but she's still in her robes, she hasn't bathed since she left the Tower, and she's afraid to think about how she smells right now.

She sits up and takes down her hair, cursing when her exploring fingers find tangles and grease. She needs a comb. She'll have to go to the quartermaster; she sighs thinking of Daveth, thumbing the Maker's Circle on her chest.

When she looks up, she realizes that someone has been in her tent while she slept; there's a pile of fabric and metal by the opening. She can just reach it with her toe, so she drags it over to where she sits. When she separates it out, she has two Grey Warden uniforms in her hands, a much lighter version of the full armor Alistair and Duncan had been wearing. There's a _very_ brief blue leather brigandine with sleeves, a long fall of scales and blue leather to cover her vitals, gloves, boots... and a buckled leather shirt and pants set.

"Oh," Marian says out loud, a catch in her voice. "_Pants_." She hugs them for a second, before she remembers how truly dirty she is, and then she drops them before she can contaminate them.

She gathers the uniforms, cramming them into her pack as best she can, and leaves her tent. The camp is busier today, with soldiers heading every which way on errands, quick and quiet and expectant. Marian ducks through the gates and goes straight to the quartermaster; he does have a comb, which she seizes with a sigh of relief. He also has soap.

She cleans him out of potions and commandeers the single extra pack he has left, dumping her finds inside; then she backtracks to find the bathing tents.

When she's finished, clean and dressed and combed, she feels like the perfect picture of a Grey Warden. It's a strange feeling.

She re-packs her things, fitting most everything in one pack, and shrugs it onto her shoulder as she looks for the cooking tent. When she finds it, it's nearly empty, but the cooks oblige her with a bowl of porridge and dried apples; she is so hungry that she goes back again for whatever they have left, which ends up being dried herring and cheese.

Finally satiated, Marian gathers her packs and ducks out of the tent into a bright spring morning, hardly more than half gone. The camp spreads out behind her, filling the tall outcropping that Ostagar sits upon; Marian cannot estimate how many are here based on the tents, but there are so many that it makes her feel a little easier about the coming battle.

She can't find Alistair, but the fourth soldier she stops has seen Duncan near the mage's encampment, and she heads that way. She finds him speaking to one of the ubiquitous Chantry sisters that have flooded the keep, and she waits for him to finish.

"Good morning," he says with a smile, turning to her. "I see that Alistair found you a uniform."

"Two, actually," she says, hefting a pack.

"Good," Duncan says. He checks the fit of her boots and gloves, the wear on the buckles, and points out several places she hadn't noticed where the leather stitching is starting to fray. The uniform has clearly had a prior owner, but that doesn't bother her.

Marian can't help what comes out of her mouth next. "Is it truly a coincidence that Alistair is a templar?"

"It is a coincidence," he says, and though there is nothing in his voice to scold her, she can feel herself flushing in shame. "Alistair was the junior Warden before you, and it was his task to lead you through the Joining. That task is now over, and if you wish to have nothing further to do with him, you may do so as long as it does not interfere with your duties or his."

"I don't..." She hesitates. "I don't dislike him," she says finally, and that is the bare truth, if nothing else. "I am wary of templars after the Circle."

"But Alistair is not truly a templar," Duncan says, mild reprove in his tone. He gestures toward the north, clearly meaning for her to precede him, and Marian mutely obeys, though she doesn't know where she's going. He falls into step beside her. "His past is his own, but I will tell you this: he was no more willing to join the Templar Order than you were to join the Circle."

"He mentioned something about that," she admits. "But..."

"You should ask him his opinion of magic sometime," Duncan says. "You might be surprised."

He says nothing else, no matter how she presses him, until they arrive at the grand table the elves had been working on the day before, now covered with close-printed maps and tiny markers. King Cailan and another man lean over the table, arguing so fiercely that they don't notice Duncan and Marian's arrival for whole minutes.

"The darkspawn horde is too dangerous for you to be playing hero on the front lines, Cailan," the dark-haired man says, rough and impatient.

_Better to leave him in Denerim, then,_ she thinks, recalling the glorified wonder in Cailan's voice. _I don't think you could keep him out of this battle with a pack of mabari and a pair of handcuffs._

They continue to argue; Cailan pulls rank at one point, which dissuades the other man not at all.

Cailan glances over at them. "Duncan, are your men ready for battle?"

Duncan bows a little in greeting. "They are, your Majesty."

Cailan nods, and then his eyes light on Marian. "And this is the recruit I met earlier on the road? I understand congratulations are in order."

Taking her cue from Duncan, she bows. "Thank you, your Majesty," she says, aware that she is mouthing platitudes, but this is not the genial boy she met yesterday on the path, and she doesn't know the other man. Prudence is the order of the day.

"Every Grey Warden is needed," Cailan says with an assessing glance. "Now, more than ever."

The dark-haired man snorts, disgusted. "Your fascination with glory and legends will be your undoing, Cailan. We must attend to reality." He gestures to the maps and tokens on the table.

"Fine," Cailan sighs. "Speak your strategy, Loghain." He bends back over the table.

This craggy man is Teryn Loghain, the Hero of River Dale? He looks like he needs a stiff drink and a nap, not necessarily in that order.

Marian lifts her chin in order to better see what they're talking about; after a minute, she gathers that their plan is to split the army in rough halves and use one half as bait, sucking the darkspawn into a prepared position in the valley under the bridge while the other half hammers them from the rear. The mages are positioned on either side of the pass on the slope of the hills to give them sight-lines, and archers and mabari are stationed with the main mass, along with the Grey Wardens.

Each type of unit has a different little flag on the table - there's even a little carved dog for the mabaris, Marian notices and rolls her eyes. _Boys and their toys..._ But it's rather impressive, all the same. She's never seen anything like this, not in all her books, and she cranes her neck to catch some of the smaller details; Duncan glances at her with an amused smile she notices out of the corner of her eye, and she drops back onto her heels, chagrined.

She's always been more curious than the people around her, which the other apprentices called brown-nosing. She calls it taking an interest in life, or staying alive for short.

"Who shall light this beacon?" the king asks, standing away from the table. He rotates his shoulders as if to get rid of stiffness.

"I have a few men stationed there," Loghain answers. "It's not a dangerous task, but it is vital."

"Then we should send our best," Cailan says. He glances over at Duncan and Marian, considering, and then nods. "Send Alistair and the new Grey Warden to make sure it's done."

"Your fascination with legends will be your undoing," Loghain says, turning away from the table in disgust.

"I'm happy to help, your majesty," Marian says, keeping a careful eye on the teryn's back. "But surely Alistair is more useful on the field."

"Your enthusiasm is appreciated," Cailan says with a smile. "No, it's best that you both go."

Loghain snorts. "You rely on these Grey Wardens too much. Is that truly wise?"

"Enough of your conspiracy theories, Loghain," Cailan says. "Grey Wardens battle the Blight, no matter where they're from." Marian glances involuntarily at Duncan standing beside her, noticing again the tone to his skin that says he is from somewhere much warmer than Ferelden.

Loghain declares the meeting over and strides off. Marian hopes that he has a bottle of something potent in his tent; it looks like he needs it.

"Alistair should be waiting at my fire," Duncan says, leading her back down the ramps. "I would rather brief you both at once."

She accepts that, but she has so many questions that she they are filling up her mind, bursting to get out. Duncan takes one look at her face and sighs. "What do you wish to know?"

"Everything," Marian says with a laugh. "You'll regret ever asking that question, you know."

"Then perhaps it could wait until after the battle?" Duncan suggests.

Marian bites her lip, but there's one thing she really wants to know the answer to now, while Duncan cannot conveniently _forget_ how Loghain bristles at the very idea that Wardens could supplant his soldiers. "Why does Teryn Loghain hate the Wardens so?"

Duncan pauses mid-step. She looks up and catches his face before he fully turns to her; he is not in this place or time, but somewhere far away, somewhere troubling.

"You could have picked a more awkward question," Duncan says, forcing a smile. "But it would have been difficult." He tilts his head – Marian is beginning to recognize this as something Duncan does while he's thinking, and waits patiently for him to get his words in order.

"Teryn Loghain has heard the stories of the Grey Wardens," he begins carefully. "Stories of our prowess in battle, of our ability to sense the location of darkspawn. He has observed us on the field of battle, and I'm afraid he has found us wanting."

Marian frowns; she's never seen Duncan fight, not in a real battle, but she has no doubt about his lethality, and if Alistair is the example of the rest of the Wardens, they must be a potent fighting force.

Duncan smiles at the look on her face. "We hold our own on the battlefield," he admits. "But any legend may fall far short of the reality, as he himself could attest."

Marian opens her mouth to protest, but shuts it again, feeling conflicted. She's heard just as many tales of River Dale as she has of the Wardens, and they were considerably more patriotic, but the man she met just looks tired. Her books all say...

But that's her problem, isn't it? This is the real world, and not everything is as cut-and-dried as it is in her books.

Duncan takes her elbow and steers her gently toward his fire. "What are you going to do about it?" Marian asks.

"What we must," he says, glancing down at her. "Remember that: Grey Wardens always do what they must. Whatever it takes to destroy the darkspawn. Loghain is not the only one with doubts, but one man's opinion makes no difference – no matter who that man may be." He releases her elbow when they reach the edge of his campsite, and the chance to speak privately is lost. She has so many questions – she always does, but she stamps them down with the ease of long practice.

"Marian knows this already," Duncan says to Alistair, waiting patiently by the fire. "You and she will go to the Tower of Ishal and ensure the beacon is lit when we signal you from the field."

Alistair frowns. "What? I won't be in the battle?"

"It is the king's personal request," Duncan says gently. "If the beacon is not lit, Teyrn Loghain's men won't know when to charge."

"So he needs _two_ Grey Wardens standing up there holding the torch," Alistair says in disbelief. "Just in case, right?"

"Even if it does need a Grey Warden, we don't both need to go," Marian argues again. Duncan has influence with Cailan, that much she can see for herself. If he would at least condone letting Alistair join the rest of the Wardens... "The king needs every soldier. Alistair should fight with the rest of you."

Sidelining Alistair is truly a waste of a good fighter, but she also needs to get away from him. She likes him, she supposes, but... Her lingering fear of him is quite irrational and she knows it. That doesn't make it go away.

Alistair turns to look at her, but she carefully keeps her eyes on Duncan. After a moment he looks away again.

Duncan raises his eyebrow at her, and she keeps her face blank and gormless. He shakes his head. "If King Cailan wishes Grey Wardens to ensure the beacon is lit, then Grey Wardens will be there." There is no arguing with him this time. The juxtaposition between the Warden-Commander and the gentle man who showed her how to curry horses is fascinating when it's not terrifying. "We must do whatever it takes to destroy the darkspawn... whether it's exciting or not."

Alistair is apparently a braver man than she is, because he says, "I get it, I get it. Just so you know, if the king ever asks me to put on a dress and dance the Remigold, I'm drawing the line."

"Why would he ever do that?" Marian asks, both unwillingly fascinated and not entirely sure she wants to know.

"I happen to be quite fetching in a dress," he says, glancing at her.

She bites her lip, not daring to say a single thing for fear of laughing. From the look on Duncan's face, if she does he will break something, which might include their heads.

"The Tower of Ishal," Duncan says, with exaggerated patience, "lies on the other side of the gorge. Marian, we passed the entrance on the way in." She nods, sobering. "We will signal you when the time is right. Alistair will know what to look for."

Marian steals a look at Alistair; he doesn't look like this is a surprise to him. At least _somebody_ knows what they're doing. "I'm ready," she says.

"As am I," Alistair says.

"Then I must join the others. From here, you two are on your own." Duncan looks at each of them, his dark eyes grave. "Remember, you are both Grey Wardens. I expect you to be worthy of that title."

Marian nods. She intends to be.

"Duncan..." Alistair says, his voice dropping. "May the Maker watch over you."

"May He watch over us all," Duncan agrees.

On the heels of his words, a giant, startling _boom_ echoes over the fortress. "What was _that_?" Marian gasps, rubbing one ear.

Duncan and Alistair exchange glances that Marian can't read. "Artillery," Alistair says.

Duncan nods to each of them and slips away. Marian shakes her head in confusion. "I thought the darkspawn were mindless," she says. "How did they build artillery?"

"Come on," he says, heading toward the bridge. Something tiny pings off of Alistair's armor, and then another; Marian looks up only to see grey, looming clouds have taken over the sky, and it is beginning to rain. She groans.

She follows Alistair to the shelter of the ruined tower at the near end of the bridge. "The darkspawn _are_ mindless," he says, pressing close to her so she can hear him over the noise. "The archdemon isn't."

That is a horrible thought she is happy not to examine too closely right now.

Something explodes on the other side – she hopes against hope that the tower in flames is not their destination, but finds that unlikely.

"We have to get to the Tower!" Alistair says, speaking louder now over the rain and the melee. There's a flood of soldiers pressing against their backs, slipping around them to take up positions on the bridge. Some are already dead; she can see bodies at the other end, proof of the artillery's accuracy. She presses against Alistair; after a moment he takes her meaning, and they push their way to the edge of the bridge.

There's nothing to do but run for it; even if they do see a projectile coming, there's nowhere to hide, and no time to get there. They make it to the other side with only one near miss, and only then does Marian unfold from the half-crouch she'd been running in. Her back twinges.

"Come on!" Alistair shouts, still running. She swears and takes off after him, her staff bumping into her back with every step she takes. At least she _can_ run – she says a paean of thanksgiving for blessed, blessed_ pants_ –

Alistair skids to a halt in front of an obviously panicked soldier, one of a pair standing at the end of one of the ubiquitous ramps. "You... you're Grey Wardens, aren't you?! The tower... it's been taken!"

Once they calm the soldier down, he tells them that the darkspawn have flooded the tower all the way to the top, spilling out of the doors as they speak, and he has only just managed to get away with his partner. Alistair and Marian exchange grim looks.

"We have to go in," Marian says, running the pads of her fingers over the potions at her belt in a quick count. "We don't have a choice. But the men on the bridge could use some reinforcement."

The soldier glances at his partner, then shakes his head. "Begging your pardon, miss – " He grimaces. "Excuse me, Warden – but I'm thinking you'll need all the help you can get." He unlimbers his shield and a large mace and turns to head back into the tower courtyard. His partner pulls out a crossbow and follows.

Marian raises an eyebrow at Alistair, who only shrugs before drawing his sword and shield and following. She takes a deep breath and follows suit.

She had been prepared to find fewer darkspawn than the soldiers reported, but if anything there were more. There are small packs surrounding one or two soldiers each scattered around the yard; most times the soldiers are dead before she and her team can rescue them, but they save one or two and she sends them back to the bridge or the hospital tents, whichever is appropriate. They take down another Alpha just before the doors, and after that grueling fight Marian is forced to ask for a small pause to recuperate. Alistair acquiesces without argument, but he watches her narrowly until her breathing steadies. It does nothing for her nerves.

The moment she feels less like a jelly inside, she stands and they walk into the Tower.

The interior is jarringly familiar; parts of Kinloch Tower look like this, a great circular room surrounded by smaller rooms on the outside walls. It's never been infested by darkspawn, though. That's a new twist.

They drive through into the great room, where Marian has her first experience with traps. After she picks herself up off the floor, and checks that all her teeth are where they belong, and makes sure that nobody is actually on fire, and pushes through the slick grease spell blocking the entrance, she is _angry_. She fries the archers while the men take on a magic user and then stalks on through the small rooms, killing darkspawn right and left, until she finds a staircase leading up to the next floor.

"Anyone know how many floors there are?" she tosses over her shoulder while striding up the stairs.

The men have been trailing her at a very respectful distance; she can practically hear them exchanging glances. The crossbowman loses the silent war not to attract her attention. "Four, I think, Warden," he says.

Alistair follows her up the stairs to cover her as she opens the door, but the first room is empty. "What are these darkspawn doing ahead of the rest of the horde?" he asks.

"They're the answer to your prayers," she says, keeping a wary eye out. "You _were_ the one complaining about missing all the fighting, weren't you?"

Alistair laughs. "I do seem to recall something like that... I guess there is a silver lining here, if you think about it."

Marian can't help laughing as the last of her pique drains away. "Well?" she asks, cocking an eyebrow at him. "Would you prefer to lead, oh fearless warrior?"

"Better me than a squishy mage," he says with a grin, bringing his shield up as he slips in front of her. "We have to hurry," he reminds her, suddenly sober. "Teryn Loghain is waiting for the signal."

"I know," she replies and takes one deep breath to settle herself. "Go."

They sweep the second floor, meeting only one sticky spot that they clear with some interestingly placed ballistae; the third floor has a similar knot of darkspawn tormenting four caged mabari, and when she lets them out of their cages, they rip the darkspawn apart with very little help from the Wardens.

She's letting Alistair precede her now that she's got her temper back; she's not ready for what she sees over his shoulder when he opens the door to the fourth floor. It's one large, round chamber, like the Harrowing chamber, and on the opposite side is the biggest creature she's ever seen, a darkspawn of grossly exaggerated proportions with giant, razor-sharp horns.

Marian inhales, a silent gasp, and grabs Alistair's arm. "What is _that_," she hisses in his ear, but even her lowest voice is too loud in the bare room.

It turns. It sees them, and it roars, spraying spittle in every direction, and Marian's grip on Alistair's arm tightens.

"Ogre," Alistair says shortly. He steps into the room, forcing Marian to let go or attach herself to him like a limpet; she lets go, to save her dignity, and slowly follows him in.

_Ogre_... She flips through the books in her mind, trying desperately to remember anything about them; weaknesses would be preferred, but anything would help. Unfortunately, she's not coming up with anything, and perhaps it's the terror fogging her mind, but she's not surprised. She's not been prepared for anything she's been through since she left the Circle; why should this be any different?

The crossbowman hangs back with her while Alistair and the other man – and how horrible is it that she hasn't even asked them their names? she thinks in a moment of madness – drive forward as the ogre comes pounding across the room. It swings one massive hand and sends Alistair flying and while she is wishing furiously for more hands or more soldiers or a blasted ballista, she spares one quick look to make sure Alistair is breathing. Then there is nothing but the fight, and pulling magic as hard and as fast as she can; sometimes her winter spell catches the ogre just right and it freezes in place, giving them a few seconds of breathing room. Otherwise there's only causing as much damage as quickly as they can manage, a task which goes much easier when Alistair levers himself back onto his feet, groaning. She breaks her stream of damaging spells to heal him as quickly as she can and then it's back to flame, lightning, and arcane bolts.

The ogre catches the soldier with the mace in his giant fist; ignoring the rest of them for the moment, it examines the man with tiny, beaded eyes. Then it sneers and rips the soldier's head clean off with its other hand. It drops the pieces on the floor and turns back to Alistair.

Marian cannot look away from the man in pieces on the floor. She is so fresh from her Joining that she can still taste the foulness on her tongue, and Jory and Daveth died horrible deaths in front of her eyes, but what has happened to the soldier is much worse than that, than even the monster in the room with her.

Her hand tightens on her staff. If they don't kill the ogre, the same thing will happen to the rest of them, and the men on the battlefield below will all die. Everything is depending on them. She tears her gaze from the doomed soldier with sheer will and looks up.

She is just in time to catch Alistair leaping through the air and planting his sword six inches into the ogre's face. He rips it free with a snarl and the ogre screams, a desperate sound in the dead air, and Alistair drives his sword in again and again until the ogre goes limp and begins to fall backward. Alistair rides out the ogre's crash-landing and disengages when it's prone, leaping backward off the ogre with a curiously cat-like movement.

Marian's jaw drops. If she hadn't just seen it, she would never have believed it.

Alistair bends right over at the waist, panting, with his hands on his knees. After a long moment, he looks sideways at her. "The _beacon_," he says urgently. "We've surely missed the signal – "

Marian shakes her head, trying to clear her mind. Too much has happened in too short of a period and her brain is foggy. "The beacon," she repeats. "Of course."

It's easily done, at least by a mage; there's an ordinary fireplace across from the door, wood already laid. She spins flame from her hands, and the kindling goes up immediately.

Alistair straightens up, heaving a long sigh. "Well, all's well that ends not catastrophically," he says, wincing. His eyes land on the headless soldier on the floor, and he sighs again. "Poor sod," he says softly. "Maker take him."

Marian looks over at the crossbowman, for the first time noticing his white beard and tired eyes. He smiles at her a little, and she tries to smile back, but it doesn't feel like she succeeded, and it feels wrong anyhow. Her eyes go back to the man on the floor, and then she turns her head so she doesn't have to look at him anymore.

She wonders how they'll know when the battle is over, and what they should do while they wait. It's just possible that they might be able to do something from –

The door slams against the wall behind her and she spins, her hand clenching on her staff; the crossbowman brings up his bow, but it is too late. A darkspawn arrow takes him in the eye, and she feels the impact of two more slam into her shoulder and ribcage. She cries out in pain; she can just see a blur of movement out of the corner of her eye that she knows is Alistair, but then he swears –

She cannot stay on her feet. She is light-headed, and something is wrong with her eyes – Another arrow slams into her stomach, and she does not cry out so much as she loses all her breath to the impact. She clings to her staff as she sinks to her knees. There is something wrong with her eyes...

The world goes away.


	11. The Witches

She wakes from a deep, drugging sleep that threatens to pull her back under – in fact, she vaguely remembers waking before and succumbing to the demands of her body, but she's determined not to fall back asleep this time. If nothing else, she has to find a necessary.

There's none of that staple in storybooks of not knowing where she is or what happened. She remembers the ogre, and the fusillade of darkspawn arrows, but she's alive and she smells no darkspawn here. Someone is standing near her.

She opens her eyes.

"Ah," the person says, revealing itself as a woman. "Your eyes finally open. Mother _shall_ be pleased."

The wilder girl from the day before is standing next to her, smiling down at Marian as if she's just performed a trick on command. Beyond her, there are walls, a fireplace, a few pieces of furniture... she's in a house, she realizes.

She wonders if she's fit for sitting up – she doesn't feel any pain lying at rest, but she knows how swiftly that can change, that tearing pain can accompany the smallest movement if she's not yet healed enough. She twitches herself all over with no pain and calls that good enough, sitting up with only a truly atrocious ache in her shoulder and hip making itself known.

"What happened?" Marian asks. She realizes that she's entirely naked underneath a thin, scratchy blanket and wonders where her clothes are.

"You were injured," Morrigan replies, a more clinical look entering her eyes. "Mother rescued you. Do you not remember?"

"I remember the darkspawn," Marian says slowly; the stench and the terror are still with her. Another thought springs from that one. "Alistair!" she gasps. "Is he – "

"The suspicious, dim-witted one who was with you before, that is Alistair?" Morrigan asks, arching her brows. "Yes, Mother managed to save both of you, though 'twas a close call."

"And the battle?" Marian spots her clothes and packs in a pile on a chest lying at the end of the bed. She slides further down the bed and stretches to reach for her smallclothes, which irritates her shoulder. She winces.

"Allow me," Morrigan says, dropping her smalls into her lap. "But first I must change your bandages."

Marian has no body modesty, thanks to the dormitories, but it's quite unnerving to stretch out naked and let Morrigan change her bandages. She can feel Morrigan's eyes on her – not sexually, but in a cold, assessing way that brings up the small hairs on the back of her neck.

"There, 'tis done," Morrigan says finally, standing.

"Thank you for healing me," Marian says carefully. It does not do to get on the wrong side of a mage, especially when you're as weak as a kitten and she seems as likely to eat you as look at you.

"I – " Morrigan pauses, sounding almost human for a moment. "You are welcome, though Mother did most of the work. I am no healer."

Marian returns to the question Morrigan neatly avoided. "The battle?"

"The man who was to respond to your signal quit the field," Morrigan says, her eyes softer with an empathy that seems ill-suited. "The darkspawn won your battle."

"_What_?" She can't believe it – _quit the field_? Teryn Loghain, the Hero of River Dale?

Then she remembers how long they'd taken to light the beacon. What if –

_That's absurd_, she tells herself, shaking off the idea. But it lingers...

"Those he abandoned were massacred to the last man," Morrigan continues. Marian concentrates on pulling her pants over her hips, but her mind reminds her of who she's talking about: the king, Duncan, all the Grey Wardens she had yet to meet, even the kennel-master who loved his mabari so well. All dead. "Your friend... he is not taking it well."

"I can't see a single reason why he should," Marian snaps, stomping her foot into her second boot. "Every Grey Warden in Ferelden was down there."

"And so would you have been, if not for Mother," Morrigan says, reminding Marian of exactly what she owes them. Not that she's likely to forget.

"Then I should thank your mother as well," Marian says, settling the tabard over her head. "Where is she?"

"Outside, with your friend." Morrigan tilts her head, regarding Marian calmly. "She wished to see you when you awoke."

She's not half done dressing, but the important parts are covered and she has no wish to keep the old witch waiting. "I should go, then," she says, standing. She feels steady enough on her feet, thank the Maker, and but for the lingering ache in shoulder and hip she would never have known there was anything wrong with her. "Thank you again," Marian adds.

Morrigan nods. "I will stay, and make something to eat."

Marian shoves the rest of her kit into her packs and slings them over her shoulder before pushing the door open.

"See?" Morrigan's mother says, and she looks over; Morrigan's mother stands with Alistair by the lake, talking to him in soothing tones. "Here is your fellow Grey Warden. You worry too much, young man."

Alistair turns and his reddened eyes say everything she needs to know about how he's feeling.

"You," he says. His voice is choked with tears and he swallows. "You're alive! I thought you were dead for sure."

Marian spreads her hands so he can get a good look. "No, Morrigan's mother does good work." She smiles at the old woman in heart-felt thanks, and she nods in return.

"Duncan's dead," Alistair says. Marian closes her eyes, remembering the man who saved her in the Tower, who showed her how to curry a horse and grieved the death of his recruit. That is the Duncan she wants to remember. Alistair is still in shock; she can hear it in his voice, the stunned incomprehension that says he does not want to believe what he knows to be true. "They're all dead. If it weren't for Morrigan's mother, we'd be dead, too."

She doesn't know how to comfort him, or even if he'd let her.

Morrigan's mother snorts. "Do not talk about me as if I am not present, lad."

"I didn't mean..." Alistair trails off, at a loss. "But what do we call you? You never told us your name."

"Names are pretty, but useless. The Chasind folk call me Flemeth. I suppose it will do." And then Flemeth smiles. _I know what you're thinking_, that smile says, _I know the stories and the tales. Who knows which ones are true and which ones aren't? _

_I do. _

After a moment, Marian asks, "You're Flemeth?"

"_The_ Flemeth from the legends?" Alistair adds. "Daveth – "

"Alistair?" Marian cuts him off mid-sentence. "Perhaps that isn't so important right now." He looks at her, confused and still subdued with grief, and she hopes that he understands her message, about ancient witches and powers and about frogs.

"You _are_ brighter than you look," Flemeth says with a sly smile. "I did wonder."

Marian smiles back, determined to get out of this place with wits and skin and companion intact. "I wanted to thank you for healing me," she says as humble as she can manage. "I remember I was badly hurt."

Flemeth waves her hand, dismissive. "Think nothing of it! We cannot have all the Grey Wardens dying at once, can we?"

"That would be a bad idea at the moment," Marian agrees. "We are Grey Wardens, and this is a Blight..." ..._except Duncan never got around to telling me what Grey Wardens actually do_, Marian thinks bitterly. She devoutly hopes Alistair knows more than he's let on so far.

"And it is your duty to unite the lands against the Blight," Flemeth finishes for her, watching them both with stern eyes. They must look a little bit like drowned puppies, Marian realizes; Alistair is what her mother would have charitably called 'out of sorts', and she feels like an ogre's chewtoy. She sighs and begins collecting her loose hair in her hands. Alistair watches her moving hands, but he's not seeing her, not really. She can feel loose sticks and dirt in the curls of her hair and she's disgusted by herself, but she binds it up in a mass and forces herself to forget about it. Baths will have to wait.

"We'll have to do something," Marian says. "But I haven't the faintest idea what."

"We were already fighting the darkspawn!" Alistair exclaims. "Why would Loghain _do_ this?"

"Now _that_ is a good question," Flemeth says, for once serious. "Men's hearts hold shadows darker than any tainted creature."

Marian remembers yesterday's conversation with Duncan about Loghain's doubts. Could that be the reason for the night's slaughter?

"Perhaps he believes the Blight is an army he can outmaneuver." Marian looks up again to find Flemeth watching her, eyes sharp and knowing. "Perhaps he does not see that the evil behind it is the true threat."

"The archdemon," Alistair says grimly.

"How do we find it?" Marian asks. "And once we've found it, how do we kill it?"

"We'll find it by going through the entire horde," Alistair says darkly. "And no Gray Warden has ever done that without the armies of a half-dozen nations at his back. Not to mention..." He deflates. "I don't know _how_."

Flemeth cocks one steely eyebrow. "How to kill the archdemon, or how to raise an army? It seems to me those are two different questions, hmm? Have the Wardens no allies these days?"

"I... I don't _know_." Alistair sighs. "Duncan said that the Grey Wardens of Orlais had been called. And Arl Eamon would never stand for this, surely." He straightens when he mentions Eamon, speaks more quickly and lifts his chin.

"You mean Eamon Guerrin, Arl of Redcliffe?" Marian asks.

"Yes," Alistair says thoughtfully. "He wasn't at Ostagar; he still has all his men. And he was Cailan's uncle. I know him. He's a good man, respected in the Landsmeet." He brightens. "Of course! We could go to Redcliffe and appeal to him for help!"

"Alistair, what happened to the treaties we found for Duncan?" Marian asks.

"Ah," Flemeth says, smiling. "There is a smart lass."

"Of course," Alistair exclaims. "The treaties! Grey Wardens can demand aid, they're obligated to help us during a Blight!"

"I may be old, but this is beginning to sound like an army to me," Flemeth says, folding her arms.

"So can we do this?" Alistair asks, excitement dwindling into uncertainty. "Go to Redcliffe and these other places and... build an army?"

"I don't know about you, but I'm not going to hang around and let those things destroy Ferelden," Marian says; she cannot help but picture her family caught in the path of the Blight. Her heart aches. "I'll do whatever it takes."

She can hear Duncan, speaking from yesterday: _Grey Wardens do what they must. Remember that_.

"Ah," Flemeth says with a smile, unfolding her arms. "So you are set, then? Ready to be Grey Wardens?"

"I am," Marian says, her eyes on Alistair. He looks up and meets her eyes, holding her gaze for only a moment before he looks away, but in that moment she sees the depths of his grief and his anger, and she knows that he is with her. "We are," she corrects herself. "Thank you, Flemeth. I don't know how we can repay you, but – "

Flemeth holds up her hand, interrupting Marian. "No, no," she says. "Thank _you_. You are the Grey Wardens here, not I." She smiles again. "And before you go, there is yet one more thing I can offer you..."

Marian waits, but that seems to be the end of the conversation, despite Flemeth's words; Flemeth turns to watch the sun tracking gently across the sky. Marian exchanges a puzzled glance with Alistair, but for lack of anything better to do she retreats to Alistair's side and puts on her belt and gloves.

She runs a weather eye over Alistair, who is slouching again and staring out over the small lake lining Flemeth's hut. He looks uninjured, and she finds it not out of the realm of imagination that he heals faster than she does, so she puts her concerns for him aside and draws her staff, occupying herself with a minute examination of its grain for possible new cracks and flaws that will affect her spells.

Soon Morrigan strides out of the hut, a practiced curve to her lips. "The stew is bubbling, Mother dear. Shall we have two guests for the eve... or none?"

"The Grey Wardens are leaving shortly, girl," Flemeth says, studying her.

"Such a shame..." Morrigan murmurs.

"And you will be joining them."

"_What?_" Frankly, Marian likes Morrigan the better for the undignified yelp that word comes out as, but she's feeling some of the same dismayed shock and is in no mood for laughing.

Flemeth cackles. "You heard me, girl. The last time I looked, you had ears!"

"Um," Marian says intelligently, then rallies. "Thank you for the offer, but if Morrigan doesn't wish to join us..."

"Her magic will be useful," Flemeth remarks, and Marian instantly thinks of fifty questions she wants answers to immediately. She can feel them written on her face, and without looking she knows that Flemeth is smirking. It's in her voice. "Even better, she knows the Wilds and how to get past the horde."

"It's up to you, Morrigan," Marian says weakly. _Damn_ her stupid face –

"Mother... this is not how I wanted this," Morrigan protests. "I am not even ready – "

Alistair leans into her, speaking low into Marian's ear while Flemeth speaks seriously to her daughter. "Won't this add to our problems? Out of the Wilds, she's an apostate," he points out.

"If we don't stop this, soon they'll have much more to worry about than one apostate," Marian points out, trying to listen to the other conversation as well as Alistair. It will give her the most terrific headache later, but it's usually possible...

"You must be ready. Alone, these two must unite – "

Alistair speaks again, unexpectedly, and she loses the thread of the other conversation. "Point taken," he says, grudging. "But you're telling her she sticks out like a sore thumb." She makes a face at him, and thankfully he quiets.

" – out you, they will surely fail, and all will perish under the Blight. Even I." Marian swiftly reconnects the sentences and is satisfied that she hasn't missed anything.

"I... understand," Morrigan says, defeated.

"And you," Flemeth says, looking at Marian and Alistair. "Do you understand? I give you that which I value above all in this world. I do this because you _must_ succeed."

"Yes," Marian agrees. Beside her, Alistair nods.

Morrigan glances at Marian, then at Alistair, and heaves a long-suffering sigh. "Allow me to get my things, if you please," she says, grudging every word.

She disappears into the hut before they can say anything one way or the other, returning quickly with packs strapped to her back.

_Perhaps she just doesn't have much_, Marian thinks dubiously, running an eye over the packs. _Is that a distillation flask? Maybe she packs quickly..._

Morrigan hesitates and then comes to a stop before Marian. "I am at your disposal, Grey Wardens. I suggest a village north of the Wilds as our first destination. 'Tis not far and you will find much you need there." She smiles, and this one she must have learned from Flemeth; it has the same sharp edges and deliberate alien nature. "Or, if you prefer, I shall simply be your silent guide. The choice is yours."

Marian raises an eyebrow. "That sounds like a fate worse than death."

Flemeth cackles. "You will regret saying that!"

"Dear, sweet mother," Morrigan says, poison in every word. "You are so kind to cast me out like this. How fondly I shall remember this moment."

"Well, I always said if you want something done, do it yourself, or hear about it for a decade or two afterwards."

Alistair frowns. "Do you really want to take her along because her mother says so?"

"Do you have a better idea?" Marian asks. "We need all the help we can get."

"I guess you're right," Alistair says, reconsidering the idea. "The Grey Wardens have always taken allies where they could find them."

"I am so pleased to have your approval," Morrigan says acidly.

Marian groans. "Can we just go?"

They can, as it turns out; there are no more surprise additions to their party and Morrigan directs them to the north.

As soon as they leave, Alistair lapses into silence, only broken if she asks him a direct question; there's very little she needs to ask him at the moment, and she doesn't want to prod him while he's so clearly upset. She leaves him alone. Unfortunately, Morrigan is relentlessly bored by the scenery and the walking and the lack of darkspawn and prods him with inane questions until he snaps at her.

After that, Marian walks between them.

She turns the tables on Morrigan, asking her so many questions about her magic and her mother and what spells she knows and even the distillation equipment that hangs from her pack that Morrigan falls into an irritated silence. They walk that way until nightfall, where Morrigan leads them to a hollow between two hills, then stalks off to hunt for dinner.

Marian surveys their equipment with dismay. Their unplanned departure from Ostagar played merry games with their supplies – between her and Alistair, they have one bedroll, a pillow made from stuffing her shifts inside each other, and a tiny pot she normally uses for tea. Luckily for their dinners, Morrigan is better prepared, but they're going to be stretched thin between here and the village.

She's prepared to fight for first watch, but Alistair gives in without a fight, lying down on the bedroll and staring at the small fire she built while waiting for Morrigan to return. Morrigan takes second watch, and Marian curls up on a slightly softer patch of dirt near the fire. She hasn't slept on the ground in years, but she's so tired that she drops right off.

Alistair shakes her awake and they get back on the road; the second day goes the same as the first, saving a quick encounter with three darkspawn. Alistair takes first watch that night, and Marian takes second.

When Marian sleeps, she looks for ways to get a good vantage point on the Black City. It's something to do at nights, and she's always been curious, so why not? She would never go in, of course, she's not stupid, but what harm could looking do?

Tonight she's building wings, painstakingly forming them from pieces of the ground. She looks down to dig up another chunk, and when she looks back up, her piece of the Fade is gone.

_She is the dragon. She is the horde, and the song, and the ceaseless, maddening yearning; she is the defiant flame, and she is the directive. She challenges the silent watcher, screaming for the sky that has always been denied her, and she is the watcher and the challenge; she is not the sky, but the sky will be hers, the sky and the earth and the water and above all she will be _free_ – _

When the dream releases her Marian rolls over and vomits. "Blessed are they who stand before the corrupt and the wicked and do not falter," she whispers shakily when she can speak again. "Blessed are the righteous, the lights in the shadow – Blessed are they... _Maker_ – " Her thumb traces endless circles on her chest as she prays. She cannot get the taste out of her mouth, because it's not in her mouth but in her mind.

"Marian?" Alistair kneels beside her, reaching out for her shoulder, but he thinks better of it and lets his hand drop. "Bad dreams, huh."

She sits back on her heels. "Maker, you can say that again," she says with a shaky laugh. "It felt – I don't know, it felt real for a minute there."

Alistair grimaces. "Well, it is real. Sort of."

"What?" Marian demands.

"You see, part of being a Grey Warden is being able to hear the darkspawn. That's what your dream was: hearing them. The archdemon, it talks to the horde, for lack of a better word, and we feel it just as they do. That's why we know this is really a Blight."

"The dragon?" Marian asks. "That was the archdemon?"

Alistair nods. "I don't know if it's really a dragon, but it sure looks like one. But yes, that's the archdemon."

"I saw it after my Joining," Marian says, looking away. "It was calling..."

"Yeah," Alistair says with a grimace. "I had that one too. It takes a bit, but eventually you can block the dreams out. Some of the older Grey Wardens say they can understand the archdemon a bit, but I sure can't."

"I'll be pestering you for advice, then," Marian says lightly, hoping she doesn't sound as scared as she feels. She doesn't dare ask Alistair what his archdemon dreams are like – what if hers are different? She _was_ the archdemon, and the horde, and the taint...

"You're welcome to it," Alistair says with a small smile. "Anyhow, when I heard you thrashing around, I thought I should tell you. It was scary at first for me, too."

"Thank you," Marian says, smiling back. "I mean it. I thought I was going mad."

Alistair laughs. "That's what I'm here for: to deliver unpleasant news and witty one-liners." He sits back on his heels, then stands. "Anyhow, you're up now, right? Let's pull up camp and get a move on."

They wake Morrigan and move north.

Two days later, they are close to the village on a long stretch of unused road. Marian hears something approaching and she stops, halting the other two in their tracks.

There's a long curve in the road ahead of them, blocking her view, and she peers through the trees lining the road...

Something rockets around the curve, heading straight for her; it's long and low, close to the road, and obviously not human or darkspawn. Marian cocks her head – is that... She kneels down as it bounds up to her, and she was right. It's a mabari. It even looks familiar.

It barks at her happily, then turns around, facing bit of road it came from, and growls, its ears flat against its head.

"Weapons out," Marian says, her eyes on the road. She pulls down her staff and brings it around and that's all the time she has before a pack of darkspawn round the corner and stop dead at the sight of her. There's an Alpha and seven other darkspawn in the pack, but Morrigan proves to be as good as her mother claimed and the mabari does its fair share, ripping out hamstrings and crushing throats if the darkspawn are unlucky enough to fall. The darkspawn are soon slaughtered and their bodies burned, and only then does Marian turn back to the mabari.

It barks at her companionably, sitting back on its haunches to pant at her. "I think this is that mabari from Ostagar," she says to Alistair.

"He was probably out there looking for you," Alistair says. "He's chosen you. Mabari are like that. They call it imprinting."

"Huh," Marian says. She kneels in front of the mabari, smoothing her hands over his head and down his flanks to check for injuries. "Well, boy? Are you mine now?"

He barks at her, and she gets a face full of mabari breath. She groans. "You did that on purpose, didn't you?" He pants happily and she rolls her eyes.

"Does this mean we're going to have this mangy beast following us about now?" Morrigan says, disdain crystallizing on every word. "Wonderful."

"Aww," Alistair says. "He's not mangy."

"What about it, boy?" Marian asks the mabari. "Are you coming with us?" She stands and takes a few steps toward the curve in the road, and the mabari rises and trots along at her side. "I guess I'd better come up with a name for you, unless you have an opinion about that as well?"

Thankfully for her sanity, the mabari doesn't answer.

"I think I'll call you Cú," she says.

Morrigan sighs loudly. "If you are quite finished fawning over that mongrel, perhaps we could proceed while the sun is still shining?"

"To Lothering, then," Marian says, and starts walking.


	12. The Reunion

In all, it is five days walk to Lothering. Morrigan leads them through more than one path that Marian would swear hadn't been there before. More often than not they disappear when she looks back over her shoulder. Eventually she stops looking.

She is still not quite certain what to think of their guide. Morrigan has taken such a shine to sharpening the edges of her tongue on Alistair, who retreats deeper into his shield of silence with every passing day. She has no idea how to dig him out, and no chance to do so with Morrigan around.

On the last day, Morrigan leads them through a cloud of brambles and onto what Marian recognizes as one of the old Imperial highways. Alistair pushes out behind her with a final stomp that speaks as loudly as a curse and looks around.

"Well, there it is," he says, and Marian turns to see a large town in the distance. "Lothering. Pretty as a painting."

It's not far, perhaps half a day's travel to the west. Marian has never been so glad to see anything in all her life. They need so much – things they left in Ostagar that Morrigan couldn't possibly replace, camping supplies for the most part. They need food to appease the bottomless pit her stomach is becoming, and above all, they need news. Loghain still has the army – where is he? What is he doing? What story has he come up with to explain Cailan's death, and how are they going to get the truth out? Where are the darkspawn now?

While she is lost in thought, Morrigan and Alistair snap and bicker at each other over her head. "_Shut it_," Marian says without looking around. She feels rather like her mother, keeping Carver and Bethany in line, and a sudden wave of pity and longing for her family rolls through her. Her mouth twists before she gets herself back under control. "Alistair," she says when she's sure her voice won't betray her. "You wanted to talk about something?"

"His navel, I suspect," Morrigan murmurs. "He's certainly been contemplating it for long enough."

"That's _enough_," Marian says, and the cold snap of it surprises even her. She takes a breath before continuing. "If the two of you can't get along we're done before we begin." They refuse to look at each other or at Marian, and for a brief, insane moment she wonders if she should make them apologize to each other the way her mother used to make her apologize to Carver... then she mentally throws up her hands and turns to Alistair. "Please, go ahead," she says.

"I thought we should talk about where we intend to go," he says slowly.

Marian hasn't been thinking as far ahead as Alistair apparently has, and she finds herself curiously uncaring; the future is so remote right now, consisting mostly of a list of impossible objectives. It's easier to restrict herself to the immediate present.

"I hadn't thought about it," she says out loud. "Who do we have treaties for?"

"The Circle," Alistair says, glancing over at Morrigan quickly; Marian bites her cheeks and says nothing. It would be the one bloody place in Ferelden she doesn't want to see ever again. "The dwarves of Orzammar, and the Dalish elves."

"Orzammar is in the Frostbacks, I know, but I have no idea where to find the elves," Marian says.

"If we head eastward towards the Brecilian Forest, we should hear word of one of the clans that wanders that area," Alistair says. "Hopefully they'll still be there. I also still think that Arl Eamon is our best bet for help."

"You said you knew the arl?" Marian asks. She doesn't want to pry, but... Well, all right, she _does_ want to pry, but she's not going to. From the shifty look on Alistair's face, she thinks he wouldn't tell her even if she did.

"I grew up in Redcliffe Castle," he says.

Marian nods. "And you think he'll help us?"

"I do," Alistair assures her, much more confidently. "He's a good man."

"All right," she says. "Then Redcliffe it is."

A whistle sends Cú racing ahead of them to scout the road; after a moment to give him some lead, she follows him, leaving Alistair and Morrigan to sort themselves out.

As they approach Lothering, the stone of the Imperial Highway starts to become cracked and patched, with tufts of grass growing along the flatter parts. Night is coming on, and despite being well past Wintersend, the south of Ferelden is forever chilly and damp. Marian folds her arms around herself to hold her shivers in.

"Oh, look," Morrigan says drily. "A welcoming party."

Marian looks up to see a group of armed men scrambling up from sitting on the road. They've blocked the way, and the smiles on their faces promise things that she won't enjoy. She sighs. "I suppose I'm doing the talking?"

A dispirited silence is her only reply. She rolls her eyes and strides forward, Cú at her side, as always. She does her best to warm her hands so she can cast. Just in case.

A skinny, weasel-quick one comes forward to meet her, a bright smile on his face. "More travelers to attend to," he says to his gang. "I'd guess the pretty one is the leader."

The thick-set one on his right looks her up and down, but it's not sexual the way she's expecting – he looks worried. "Er..." he says slowly. "They don't look much like them others, you know. Maybe we should just let these ones pass..."

"Nonsense," the leader says through gritted teeth, smiling for all he's worth. "Greetings, travelers!"

Alistair stands at her left, his shield fixed on his arm. "Highwaymen," he says in disgust. "Preying on those fleeing the darkspawn, I suppose."

"They are fools to get in our way," Morrigan says behind her. "I say teach them a lesson." She is more businesslike than before, and Marian prefers her this way, instead of the icy mocking she delivers to Alistair.

"Now is that any way to greet someone?" the leader demands. He sighs mockingly. "A simple ten silvers and you're free to move on."

Marian rests her hand on Cú's head. "You should listen to your friend," she says quietly. "We're not refugees."

Marian is aware that she's not the most imposing of people – she's short, after all, and skinny and sort of knobbly. But surely Alistair, who is six feet if he's an inch and all over muscles, is slightly more intimidating. Come to think of it, haven't they ever seen a Grey Warden uniform? Or a war dog?

"The toll applies to everyone, Hanric," the leader says patiently. "That's why it's a toll and not, say, a refugee tax."

The light dawns in Hanric's eyes. "Oh, right. Even if you're no refugee, you still gotta pay."

Even if she wanted to, they couldn't afford to pay the 'toll'; they need every silver they've scraped up along the way, and in fact Alistair and Marian are carrying a good deal of miscellaneous items that Alistair says will be worth their weight in trade with the first merchant they meet.

That's all beside the point, though. She doesn't want to pay and sees no reason why they should. "Alistair, do you happen to have ten silver on you?" she asks lightly, never taking her eyes off the leader.

"I'm afraid you find me financially embarrassed," Alistair returns in the same tone of voice. He takes one step to his left, giving them both clear room to draw their weapons.

"Well, you heard him, lads," she says, dropping her hand from Cú's head. Cú is being impossibly good; he's not even growling. Only she can feel how tense he is, his muscles coiled and ready for the initial lunge that would bring his target down to his level. "We don't seem to have a single coin on us."

"Ah! And if I don't believe you?" the leader asks, mocking. "How do we solve this predicament?"

Marian reaches around and draws her staff. A heartbeat later Alistair has his longsword in his hand, and Cú shows his teeth. She doesn't need to look around to know that Morrigan has her staff out – she can feel Morrigan tapping into the Fade.

"Pity," the leader says. "Let's finish this, gents!"

Cú is in the air before she can blink, barreling into Hanric and knocking him over. She slaps a force field around the leader and when she looks back, Cú has ripped out Hanric's throat.

"_Disable_, Cú," she screams over the battle's noise, fighting the urge to vomit. "Disable, don't kill!"

It goes better from that point; she freezes another bandit and leaves him to Alistair, turning to the next target. There were only five of them, and soon Morrigan is picking at an archer behind them while Cú snaps at his heels, and Marian and Alistair are tag-teaming the leader.

"All right," the leader says, throwing down his sword. "All _right_, we surrender!" He swallows, looking around at the bodies of his men. "We... we're just trying to get by, all right? Before the darkspawn get us all!"

"You're extorting helpless people fleeing the darkspawn," Marian says flatly. Cú returns to her side, and despite her horror at what she'd inadvertently commanded him to do, and despite the blood soaking his fur, she leans into her dog. "You're a _criminal_."

"Yes, I'm a criminal," he says slowly. He sounds confused. "I admit it." When her face doesn't change, he adds, "I... apologize?"

Marian shakes her head and glances over at Alistair, who shrugs and continues cleaning the blood off his longsword.

"No," she says. "We're taking you to the guard, you and whoever else is still alive."

"There's no guard here," the leader says desperately. "There's just the templars, and they'll execute me!"

Marian sucks in a surprised breath and holds it, feverishly thinking; she doesn't _want_ to kill them, but... Then another thought comes to her, and she relaxes with a laugh. "Yes, and I'm sure you're being totally honest with me, but let's just go check for ourselves, all right?"

He looks from her resolute face to Alistair, who is giving a great impression of ignoring him completely, and then to Morrigan behind her; she has no idea what impression Morrigan is giving him, but he looks completely unnerved. "I'm not going down without a fight!" he cries, and lunges for his sword.

Marian wasn't expecting anything like this; Cú lunges from under her hand, but shaking her off costs him and she's too slow with her frost spell. The bandit nearly cuts her throat before Alistair impales him on his sword. Morrigan kills the archer behind them and then there is silence.

Marian bites her lip until she thinks her voice is steady again. Then she says, "Thanks."

"Don't mention it," Alistair says dismissively, already leaning over the bandit leader's body. Then he glances up. "But you could stand to be a little sharper on the draw."

This part has never been to Marian's taste, but it's necessary if they want to buy any of the supplies they need... She sighs and leans over the body of the nearest bandit, searching for his coin purse.

The bandits have done a brisk trade, indeed; they triple their coin and find a few choice items in the crates forming part of the barricade. Marian stands looking at the coin in her hands. She knows where it came from, and to her it looks dirty. She glances at Alistair. "Can we afford to give half of it to the Chantry?"

He smiles. "I think we'll manage." She smiles back, and after a moment Morrigan snorts.

"Perhaps you should wait for us on the other side of the town," Marian says to her. "You don't exactly blend in."

"Gladly," Morrigan bites, and stalks off. She is walking down the road, directly toward the break in the stone, a foot from falling to a painful death; Marian opens her mouth to warn her, but then Morrigan shimmers. In her place is a hawk, which beats at the air with powerful wings and flies off down the road.

Marian blinks. "Did you know she could do that?" she asks Alistair.

He shakes his head, watching the hawk that is Morrigan disappear into the distance.

"Me neither," she says. She resolves to ask Morrigan to teach her that very night, if she can; Morrigan might be annoyed with her now, but Marian has a very pretty surprise that might change her mind.

They take one last look around and it's only then that Marian notices another body hidden behind one of the carts in the barricade. She goes over to check him, but when she draws near she realizes that this isn't a bandit. The body is wearing plate armor, and it's difficult to turn over, but she finally manages to get the right leverage and the body flops onto its back.

The templar emblem stares at her from the chestpiece.

"Oh, _bugger_," Marian swears.

"What?" Alistair asks, mildly alarmed. He drops the much-used cloth and starts over to her.

"This one's a templar," she says, watching him out of the corner of her eye.

"They must have robbed him before we came along," Alistair says, kneeling down by the man's legs. "Poor sod." He doesn't seem unduly upset, and Marian turns back to the body.

"Do you think the Chantry will want his things?" she asks.

"I'm sure of it," he replies. "I'll check down here."

Between them they find a note and a locket with a cameo painted inside. Marian reads the note, humming.

"He was on a quest," she says to Alistair, offering him the note. He shakes his head and she folds it up tight and presses it inside the locket. "For the Urn of Sacred Ashes, of all things."

Alistair shakes his head, but he seems more amused than anything. "A few of them go off every year to look for it. Most of the time they just come back, poorer but wiser. Some don't come back at all." He stands and pulls his tabard back into position.

Marian stands too, but she looks at the locket in her hands thoughtfully. "The note seemed more urgent than that. He said something about a conspiracy, and that many knights are seeking."

Alistair frowns. "Maybe something's happened?"

"Something like the king of Ferelden dying?" Marian points out.

"Oh. Right," he says, drooping a little. Marian wishes she hadn't said anything, but it's too late to take it back; she turns and looks at the town to give him some space, and he leans over and picks up their packs.

Lothering is both larger and smaller than Marian imagined; it's quite a large town, with scattered farming houses spreading out into the distance, but half of the houses are empty. A thin, steady stream of refugees pours in from the south, fleeing the Blight; they leave almost as soon as they come, heading for points north. Everyone seems to believe that the darkspawn are coming to Lothering next, and as Marian examines a map of Ferelden in her head, she has to agree. Much as Ostagar is the choke point for anyone wishing to move north from the Korcari Wilds, Lothering is the first stop the darkspawn will make before spilling out into the Bannorn.

They make their way to the center of town, and Alistair starts asking passers-by about merchants, and for any news they may have. Marian quietly listens to one woman's story of demons passing in the night to take her baby, and then drifts away. She is not as patient as Alistair seems to be, and she's nervous about the staff holstered on her back. Perhaps she should go wait with Morrigan –

" – Bethany? You're sure?"

Marian whirls. There are two women behind her, walking away toward the other end of the street, their heads close together. One has long, grey hair, and the other, much younger, has curly black hair not unlike Marian's.

Marian takes one hesitant step, then another. Then she stops. _It's not an uncommon name_, she tells herself. _You know what happens when you get your hopes up _–

It's too late, though; she knows that, too.

She says something to Alistair and Cú, though she will never remember what, and follows the women to the end of the street, staying close by the housefronts as she passes. She's not sure why she's lurking around like a thief in the night – it would be easier to just go up and ask, but what if she's wrong? It's been ten years, and all she remembers of her mother is a child's idealized view of her parents. Bethany has had ten years to grow up. She's just seeing what she wants to see, that's all.

Marian's heart feels like it's two sizes too large, gigantic with fear and hope in equal proportion, feeding on each other until she is a mess of emotions with no outlet. She feels like she's going to explode.

What if she's right?

The women turn into a tiny side alley leading to the river and Marian hesitates before peering around the corner. The alley is empty, and she takes a step in. _Where did they go?_ she wonders; there is no exit save the river, or climbing over someone's roof.

"Someone you're looking for?" A voice asks from behind her, and she turns. The younger woman stands before her, walking stick in hand, and glares at her. She cannot be more than sixteen, and Marian inhales sharply as the hope blooming in her chest becomes near unbearable. "Why are you following us?"

Marian swallows. "I heard... Is one of you named Bethany?" she asks.

"Why do you ask?" the young one snaps.

The older woman narrows her eyes, though, and searches every inch of her face. "I had a sister named Bethany," Marian says to the young one, though she cannot take her eyes from the older woman's face. "And I had a snot-nosed little brother named Carver – " Her voice creaks embarrassingly, and she stops.

"Marian?" her mother whispers. "Can that truly be you?"

She nods, taking a deep breath. "It's me," she says, and a tremulous smile grows on her face even while she's wiping tears from her eyes. "I'm home, Mama."

Her mother takes two long steps and folds Marian into her arms, and now she's not sure whose tears are running down her face but she knows she's laughing at the same time. Someone tugs her into a house and then Bethany is there too, and she lifts an arm from her mother's waist to cling to her little sister.

It's a long time before Marian feels able to disengage, but she keeps hold of their hands as she sinks down onto a chair and looks around. They're in a tiny kitchen with a tiny table and three chairs, and Marian recognizes a few things from her childhood: her mother's massive kettle and tiny cream pot, the breadboard, even the woven baskets. This kitchen smells just like she remembers their kitchen in Byerley. She takes great breaths in through her nose, relishing the smells of baking bread, of her mother's favorite sachets, and she sighs happily.

"I can't believe I found you," she says, laughing. "I thought I'd have to search all of Ferelden."

"I'm so glad you did," Mother says, squeezing her hand. "Though I can't believe it either!"

"But where have you _been_?" Bethany bursts out, leaning forward over the table on her elbows. "I don't even remember what happened, but we had to move – and you didn't come with us? Where _were_ you?"

"I nearly roasted an annoying boy in the market," Marian says, her eyes drifting as she remembers that day. "He was a right little pig, though I suppose even he didn't deserve a fire cone," she admits grudgingly.

"Oh, Marian, you _didn't_ – " her mother begins, looking so aggrieved that Marian is half afraid she will travel back to Byerley just to apologize to the boy's mother.

"I didn't!" she says. "I swear! And it was a complete accident and no one should get upset in any way," she rushes on when it looks like her mother will go on about something that happened _ten years ago_.

"Anyway, his mother went straight to the templars, and I knew that they'd come looking for me... " She is finding it hard to explain her reasons, and in the end decides to skip over that part. It's too much like justifying her decision, and she doesn't feel like it needs any justification. "So I ran out and told you and Carver to tell Father that the templars were coming," Marian says to Bethany. "And then I went back and waited for them."

"But _why_?" her mother asks, horrified. "Marian – " she takes Marian's hands and covers them with her own, like she's trying to shield the child Marian was. "We would have protected you, darling. If nothing else, we know how to cover our tracks." She glances at Bethany, and there's amusement there, sharing a joke that Marian doesn't understand.

"But it was my fault," Marian says, frowning. "And I couldn't just lead them to Father." She looks around. "Where is Father, anyway? And Carver?"

Her mother and Bethany exchange glances. A half-formed dread begins in her mind; _what aren't they telling her?_

"Carver joined the army," Bethany says, a faint note of pride in her voice. "He went to Ostagar with King Cailan."

"He what?" Marian demands. Her voice rises half an octave in distress. "Don't you – do you know what happened at Ostagar?"

"Yes," Mother says gravely. "Teryn Loghain marched the army through two days ago. He took the bann with him, and all his soldiers."

"Was Carver with them?" Marian asks, seized by a sudden hope.

"No," Bethany says. "But he's not dead." She smiles, so sure in herself that Marian cannot help but believe her.

"How do you know?" she asks.

"I've always known," Bethany says. "I always know where he is – he always knows where I am. We know if one of us is hurt. I would know if he were dead, because part of me would be dead too."

Marian waits for Bethany to say something else, to explain what on the surface is a completely mad statement, but she just laughs and Marian looks at their mother in confusion.

"They've always been like that," Mother says, looking at Bethany in wry amusement. "I don't know how she knows half of the things she does about him, but... " She trails off. "I believe her. I have to."

"Then where _is_ he?" Marian demands.

Bethany looks over her shoulder, to the south. "That way," she says, pointing south-west. "Two days. He keeps running into the foothills," she says with a wry twist to her mouth. "He's no bloody sense of direction at all."

There are only three chairs in the kitchen.

Marian's never heard of anything even remotely like this. She wants very badly to dissect it, to understand it, but there is something niggling at the edges of her mind, and it won't be quieted.

"Then Carver's all right," she says slowly. "Fine. Where's Father?"

Bethany and Mother exchange another one of those _glances_, the ones that leave her feeling disturbed. "What is it?" Marian demands. "What aren't you telling me?"

There are only three chairs.

"Your father died, my darling," her mother says slowly, holding Marian's hands so tightly they'll leave marks. "Three years ago."

"No," she says desperately. Her stomach drops, leaving an empty space in her chest where her heart should be. Her breath comes slow and shaking, and she can feel tears starting to form. Her eyes burn. "_No_ – " But her mother gathers Marian into her arms and Bethany comes around the table to pet her hair, and then the tears fall, hot and angry.


	13. The Volunteers

Sorry about the radio silence last week. I'll try not to let it happen again.

* * *

The time passes quickly from one story to the next until Marian can no longer keep her conscience at bay about deserting Alistair. She hugs her mother and sister and makes them promise that Carver is close and they will leave as soon as he arrives. They make plans to meet in Kirkwall, plans Marian is not entirely sure she will be able to keep, but she cannot bear to let them go so soon after finding them again.

As she leaves, she knows she is leaving part of herself behind, the best part.

It is long after dark when she leaves, and the market is empty. She has just decided to find Morrigan's camp when a burst of noise catches her attention to a small pub across the way, the only place in Lothering that doesn't look like it's in a ghost town.

She'll just put her head in, she decides, and see if Alistair has succumbed to the siren lure of the bottle. She doesn't think he's the sort to drink away their supplies, but it doesn't hurt to be sure.

She opens the door into one large room with a long balcony on the back wall. Two men and a woman are scrubbing bloodstains from the floor. When he sees her, one of the men stands and comes over to her.

"We don't want any trouble," he says urgently.

"Nor I," Marian says, completely mystified. "Is something wrong?"

"Just _go_," he says, nearly begging. "The other one was bad enough – " His eyes flicker to the top of her staff protruding over her shoulder. She can see the horrified realization in his face. _Mage_.

She whirls and slams the door behind her; in her fury she doesn't even look where she's going, taking long strides into the darkness while she fumes. Don't they _realize_ that she'd never had a choice in what she is? She's not a blood mage or a maleficar, how can she make them understand?

_I can show them I'm different,_ she thinks, and her steps slow. _I can go back – I can _make_ them see –_

She stops, horrified at herself and what she's thinking. It doesn't even feel like her thoughts, now that she's paying attention, and she traces them back and finds a demon at the other end.

_Almost had you,_ it says, smug, then the presence in her mind fades and she is alone.

Marian presses the heels of her hands into her eyes, feeling the stinging that announces another crying jag. She's balanced on the edge of a precipice, with a long drop and an unpleasant landing if she can't get control of her emotions.

She misses her father. It has only been bearable these last ten years because she knew they would end. This is an ache that will never go away.

She slowly bends her steps toward Morrigan's camp, paying more attention to the roiling mix inside her head than what's going on outside. When Cú tears up to her and nearly bowls her over with affection disguised as drool, she jumps. Alistair is close behind him. "Where have you _been_?" he says under his breath. "I've been looking for you everywhere – anyhow, I thought we could use some help." He takes her elbow and drags her forward – she's not resisting, she's bewildered and feeling slow and stupid. Today has been too much and she just wants to sleep.

Alistair takes her to a redhead in Chantry garb, standing at the base of the windmill. She and Alistair look at her expectantly.

"Um," Marian says, at a loss. "Hi?"

"Thank you _so_ much for letting me come," the redhead gushes with a marked Orlesian accent, leaping forward to take Marian's hands in hers. "I won't let you down! I know I can help you. The Maker told me so."

Marian blinks and slowly draws her hands away from Leliana's. "_What_?"

"This is Sister Leliana," Alistair breaks in, speaking fast as if that will make her forget what the crazy woman just said. "I was in the bar – don't look at me like that, someone told me the bartender had health potions for sale – and some soldiers of Loghain's jumped me. She saved my life, her and Cú."

"That's fantastic," Marian says through her teeth, pulling him away from Sister Leliana to speak privately. "Congratulations on your continued existence. How does that turn into bringing a completely mental stranger along?"

Alistair shrugs. "I know she's a little strange, but she seems more... 'Ooh, pretty colors!' than 'Muahaha! I am Princess Stabbity! Stab, kill, kill!'" His vocal contortions are fascinating, and Marian catches herself in a laugh before she can stop herself.

"We don't know her," she points out. "How do you know we can trust her?"

"I don't," Alistair says with another shrug. "But we need all the help we can get."

"But why _her_?" Marian asks, eyeing Leliana dubiously.

"You and Morrigan are mages," Alistair says. "I'm on the front lines alone. She's sneaky, she'll do well on our flank."

Marian sighs. "Fine, but if she murders us all in our beds, I reserve the right to say 'I told you so'."

"Fair enough," Alistair says with a grin. "Oh, and before I forget..." He sobers, and without the good humor he looks as tired and unhappy as she feels. "Loghain passed through two days ago. He's saying that the Grey Wardens betrayed Cailan at Ostagar. There's a price on our heads big enough to attract every sellsword this side of the Waking Sea."

Marian absorbs that, one more blow in the fistfight that this day has been, and sighs. "Perfect," she says, looking down at her uniform, which she's quickly become attached to. "We'd better get rid of these, then." That more or less explains what the bartender was on about, but... "How do you know she's not after the reward, then?" she asks, eyeing Leliana again.

Alistair rubs the back of his neck, sheepish. "I was pretty wrecked after the fight. She could have taken me if she wanted to, easily."

Marian is prepared to admit that perhaps her paranoia is getting out of hand. That doesn't make her any the less concerned.

"All right," she says, giving up. She turns away from Alistair, rubbing her eyes harshly. They're sore and gritty after her earlier emotional purge, and she needs to wash her face and drink a lake's worth of water and go to sleep.

She looks up to see a giant in a cage. His eyes are upon her, and she takes one shocked breath, but then the fright fades and is replaced by familiar curiosity. She draws nearer, unable to resist.

"You aren't one of my captors," the giant says in a deep, rumbling voice. He's just so _big_, she wonders; even Alistair barely comes up to his chin, and Alistair is six foot if he's an inch. His skin is curiously grey under a purpley sort of brown, and his skull sweeps back past his ears before terminating abruptly. He is no human, nor dwarf nor elf, and that only leaves –

"You're a qunari, aren't you?" Marian demands. "What are you doing this far south?"

He eyes her with burgeoning interest. "And you are no villager, to recognize me at a glance," he says, then seems to lose his interest. "Begone, human. I will not amuse you any more than I have the other humans. Leave me in peace."

Leliana drifts closer, following Alistair as they notice her standing in front of the cage. "The revered mother said he slaughtered an entire family," she says quietly. "Even the children."

The giant spares her one assessing glance before he turns his eyes back to the night sky over their heads. "It is as she says."

"But _why_?" Marian asks, distressed.

He makes an impatient noise and glances down at her again. "Did I not ask you to leave me in peace?"

"You did," she returns, crisp and offended. "Goodbye." She whirls on one booted foot and stalks away, leaving Alistair, Leliana, and Cú to trail her like small ducks following their mother. She skirts the windmill, making for the ubiquitous ramps that lead back onto the Imperial highway.

"To be left here to starve, or to be taken by the darkspawn..." Leliana says, so quietly, but it hits Marian like a fist. "No one deserves that, not even a murderer."

"Urgh, eaten alive by darkspawn," Alistair says, further back. "Fun. I wonder why the revered mother is so afraid of him."

"She is afraid of the Blight," Leliana says. "She cannot do anything about the darkspawn, but she _can_ do something about the qunari."

Her instinctive revulsion prompts an idea, which horrifies even her. _But he's a murderer_, she protests to herself. It doesn't seem to make a difference. She sighs and stops. "Leliana, do you think the revered mother would release him to your custody?"

"You're going to let him go?" Alistair asks. "Is that really a good idea?"

"I'm not letting him go," she says. "He's coming with us."

She talks right over their objections and bullies them into agreeing. "She might still be awake," Leliana says finally. "I'll go now." She disappears into the darkness.

"Is this my revenge for recruiting Leliana?" Alistair asks, only half-joking.

"Yes," Marian agrees with a faint smile. "So think carefully before you try it again." She digs into her pack. "Go with Leliana to the Chantry and deliver this," she says, holding out poor doomed Ser Henric's cameo and the note. "It mentions someone named Ser Donall. Oh, and they should probably know about the bandits."

"All right," Alistair says, accepting the locket. He looks slightly dazed at the stream of instructions.

Another thought strikes her. "Oh, and is there any money left over?"

He smirks and digs out a coin purse, tossing it to her. It feels suspiciously heavy, and she raises her eyebrows at him.

"I'm not all muscles, you know," he says, grinning, and strolls off.

"Come along, Cú," Marian says, slipping through the alleys toward her mother's house.

She returns, the coin purse much lighter, to find Leliana and Alistair waiting close to the giant's cage. "We have more news," Alistair says the instant he spots her. When she draws closer she can see that he's upset, tense lines drawn through his face and creasing his forehead. "Arl Eamon is ill. He's – " He breaks off, and Leliana lays a slim, comforting hand on Alistair's shoulder. He sighs. "Ser Donall said he's dying."

"They search for the Urn of Sacred Ashes, for a cure," Leliana says. "But none have found any trace."

Marian sighs. "We may need to rethink our first destination, then. But first things first: the key, Leliana?" Leliana takes a large wrought-iron key from her pocket and presents it to Marian with a smile. "Good," Marian says. "Stay here while I talk to him."

She approaches the cage, Cú at her side; the giant is still awake, staring at the sky as if he hasn't moved since they left him. "What more do you wish of me?" he asks her, startling her. "I will not indulge you in idle chatter."

"I don't really have the patience for idle chatter right now," Marian says. She holds up the key. "This is the key to your cage. The revered mother has agreed to release you into my custody."

"And who are you to persuade the priestess of such a foolish plan?" he says, watching her intently now. They must make quite the spectacle, Marian thinks, girl and mabari and qunari, all standing still as statues in the night.

"I'm a Grey Warden," she says. "I am sworn to defend against the Blight."

The giant looks her up and down. "You are a Grey Warden? Even in the far north, we have heard the legends of their strength and skill." He scrutinizes her again. "But I suppose not every legend is true."

"And I've heard qunari called 'the warmongers of the north.'" She looks him up and down, deliberately aping his dismissive glance. "I suppose not every legend is true."

He snorts. "We are called a lot of things." He examines her once more, looking for what she can't say, and then he nods. "Very well. Set me free, and I will follow you against the Blight."

The key sticks for one heart-stopping moment, and then the rusted pins catch hold and the lock turns. The giant pushes the door open and she steps back, out of the way, as he comes out of the cage. He seems even larger, if that's possible, when out of the confining metal. He draws in a deep breath of air through his nose. "So it is done," he says, almost to himself. He looks at the stars once more before turning to Marian. "I will follow you into battle. In doing so, I shall find my atonement."

"What if I don't lead you to your atonement?" Marian asks carefully.

"Then I will find it myself."

She believes him, she decides after a moment's thought, and nods.

He inclines his head just a little. "I am Sten, of the Beresaad-the vanguard-of the qunari."

"I'm Marian," she says. She thinks of the tangle that is her name, and sighs. "Just Marian."

"Warden," Sten says, and the note of finality in his voice announces his intent to call her that forever. She rolls her eyes and hopes he can't see her face in the dark. "Lead the way."

They're ambushed by a party of darkspawn on the highway, but with five in their party now they tear through the opposition – Marian personally witnesses Sten rip a darkspawn's head off with his bare hands, which is going to give her nightmares – and save a dwarf merchant and his son, who offer to give them supplies to make up what they're lacking.

Morrigan has a giant fire burning well down the road, and she gives them an arch look when they tramp into the campsite, sore, tired, and laden down with things that Bodahn insisted on giving them. She and Leliana strike sparks immediately and settle down on opposite sides of the campsite to glare at each other, giving Alistair and Marian time to figure out where they're going next.

"If the arl is sick..." Marian says, trailing off. "Alistair, maybe it's better if we go somewhere else."

"But what if he needs help?" Alistair asks, appealing.

"We are neither of us healers," she points out. "I'm not sure there's anything we can do."

"But from here, Redcliffe is on the way to Orzammar," Alistair says, staring into space behind her. Marian suspects that if she turned around, there'd be an imaginary map painted in the air. "It's about a day's journey, so we'd be stopping there anyway. Can't we just, I don't know, stick our heads in?"

"Well reasoned," Marian says with a faint smile. "How can I argue with logic?" She shifts on her log, moving until she can see the whole camp. "Go on to bed," she says without looking at Alistair. "I'll wake you for third watch." It's so late that they're just now starting second watch and she's so tired, but this is the watch rotation they've been using this last week. It's not fair to change it up just because her entire world has turned upside down.

Alistair regards her critically, and she doesn't know what he sees in her but he leans back against another log and says, quite casually, "I'll take this watch. You look done in."

"I'm all right," she protests.

"Don't think I don't know what you've been doing," he says, fixing her with his eyes; then his expression warms. "Thank you. But now – I don't know what happened to you today, but it's your turn now." Alistair gets up and comes over to her, holding out his hand to lift her from her seat. "Go to bed, Marian," he says quietly. "It'll look better in the morning."

"Liar," Marian says, taking his hand. She sighs. "But thank you."

She cries herself to sleep in her tent, Cú warm and restless against her back.


	14. The Bastard

AN: short chapter this week, in order to make room for what's coming down the pipe.

* * *

"Your taste in companions is lamentable," Morrigan remarks over their breakfast the next morning. "The qunari apparently do not allow mages to roam free." She pauses, drawing Marian's glance. "The precise word he used was _unleashed_."

Marian's eyes immediately snap to Sten; he sits a little away from the other side of the fire and watches them with unblinking eyes. She and Morrigan share a glance, full of rage and the promise of vengeance, and in that moment she and Morrigan are the same; there is an all-consuming dark fire that burns in their hearts, the kind that feeds on the finer emotions and leaves nothing behind except anger.

It leaves her feeling strangely unsettled, and much closer to Morrigan than she had been before.

They pack camp and leave for Redcliffe down the Imperial Highway. Marian reluctantly leaves her Warden uniforms in her packs and puts her Circle robes back on. It feels like going backward, reverting to the person she'd been only two weeks ago, someone whose only plan was escape, someone who had something to run to. She hates the reminder, but Alistair and Sten are even worse off, dressed and armored in what they could scavenge or trade for in Lothering. Then there's Leliana in her Chantry robes, and Morrigan, an obvious apostate... Marian surveys the motley group of people they've somehow assembled and sighs. They'll be lucky if they even make it to Redcliffe.

It's five days hard walk to Redcliffe, and Marian ignores her companions to remember little things about her father: the way his beard pricked the palm of her hand when she patted his face, the seriousness with which he taught her the basics of magic, he and her mother teaching each other to cook, the look on his face when he brought her to meet Bethy and Carver. She does notice Alistair running interference for her, and she's grateful to be left alone with her thoughts. She needs them more than ever now.

They trail down the path in a dispirited gaggle of tired and dusty travelers. When they finally sight the village, on the edge of Lake Calenhad far below, Alistair heaves a great sigh and turns to Marian. "I need to talk to you," he says. "Alone."

Morrigan huffs and wanders off; Leliana tows Sten away, chattering at him the whole way, and Marian turns back to Alistair with a raised eyebrow. If he's about to speak to her regarding her introspective silence, she has a few choice words about leaving the entire burden on her shoulders in the Wilds...

"Look, I need to tell you something I, ah, should probably have told you earlier." He's anxious enough that little lines have drawn themselves around his eyes and the crease of his forehead, and he doesn't seem to want to look at her.

She takes a breath. "All right," she says. "I'm listening."

"Well, let's see. How do I tell you this?" Alistair frowns. "Did I say how I know Arl Eamon, exactly?"

Marian tries to remember. "I think you said you grew up in Castle Redcliffe."

"Right," Alistair says. "He raised me. I'm a bastard." He takes a deep breath and starts speaking so fast that she has trouble keeping up. "My mother was a serving girl at Redcliffe castle and she died when I was born. Arl Eamon took me in and raised me before I was sent to the Chantry." He pauses for breath, and continues only reluctantly. "The reason he did that was because... well, because my father was King Maric. Which made Cailan my... half-brother, I suppose."

Marian stares at Alistair, speechless. "_What?_" she manages after a minute of pure, dazed shock. He shrugs, uncomfortable and fidgeting under her glare, and then Marian actually looks at Alistair's face for the first time since they'd met and the resemblance between him and Cailan snaps into place like the answer to a riddle. If Alistair let his hair grow, or Cailan sheared his, they could have been fraternal twins.

Suddenly so many things make sense. Alistair had been kept well out of things in Ostagar, where they needed every warrior. And he hadn't only been mourning his mentor.

"Does that make you a prince or something?" Marian asks, furiously reassessing their situation. This definitely made things more... interesting.

Alistair goes a shade of pale that she wouldn't have believed possible with his skin tone. "Maker's breath, I hope not! I don't think so... you don't think so, do you? I'm a bastard, and nobody even knows about me." The look he gives her is so appealing that she automatically opens her mouth to reassure him, but she stops herself. After a moment's thought, she sits on the river's edge, dangling her feet over, and watches the village far beneath her feet. Alistair joins her, and they sit in silence.

"So you're a royal bastard, huh," she says after a while.

"Like I haven't heard that one before," Alistair says; when she looks over, he's just finished rolling his eyes at her, but he has the grace to look abashed when caught out. She smiles a little and then looks back at the village. It looks so peaceful from up here...

"I would have told you," he says. "Really. It just... it never really meant anything to me. I was inconvenient, a possible threat to Cailan's rule and so they kept me secret. I've never talked about it, to _anyone_. Everyone who knew either resented me for it or they coddled me... even Duncan kept me out of the fighting because of it."

Marian looks up at Alistair, and he looks back; he is so sincere that his eyes are practically blazing with his wish that she believe him, and she does. Whatever his past, it's hardly the match of hers, and she has her own secrets that in the interest of fairness, she should probably tell him.

She smiles, a little ruefully, and Alistair heaves out a huge, relieved breath. "You're not mad?" he asks, carefully feeling for footing.

"No," she says, looking away. "If nothing else, we haven't had much of a chance to talk. I only met you – Maker, it hasn't even been two weeks since..." She glances at Alistair, wishing she'd stopped that sentence before she did, but he's not as upset as she expected.

Marian wishes with all her might that there were fewer conversational pitfalls waiting to trip her around him.

"True," Alistair says thoughtfully. "Well, I'm still sorry I didn't tell you sooner."

"So you grew up here?" Marian asks, taking in the incredible vista. The castle sits on its own, separated from the village by an expanse of glassy water. Tiny boats dot the water, and there are a few larger ships here and there, sitting far out from shore. She wonders if she still gets seasick; she'd been too upset to pay attention to her body on her trip with Duncan.

She wonders if her father ever sailed on this water.

Cú barks up at her from the path below, and she leans out a little and grins at him, thankful for the distraction.

"At the castle," Alistair says, his hand hovering near her arm. He drops it when she leans back. "Well, until I was ten." He looks over at the castle in the distance, shading his eyes against the bright sun. It's hard to read his face. "Arl Eamon eventually married a young woman from Orlais, despite all the problems it caused with the king so soon after the war. He loved her a great deal." He laughs, a short, irritated snort that tells her exactly how he feels about the arlessa. "She resented the rumors which pegged me as the arl's bastard. They weren't true," Alistair says, shrugging. "But of course they existed. The arl didn't care, but she did. So off I was packed to the nearest monastery at age ten." He stares down at the village, a haze of memories in his eyes. "Just as well. The arlessa made sure the castle wasn't a home to me by that point. She despised me."

"But you were just a boy," Marian objects, distressed.

Alistair shrugs. "She felt threatened by my presence, I can see that now. I can't say I blame her. She wondered if the rumors were true herself, I bet."

"Now you're making excuses for her," Marian says, unreasonably upset. She can't help remembering her earlier vision of Alistair as a child, the tow-headed little boy alone in the dark. "She was the adult. It was her responsibility to act like one."

Alistair turns to her and raises his eyebrow, smirking at her until she rolls her eyes and shoves him away. She scrambles up and whistles for Cú, who pretends to ignore her as he snaps at invisible small animals in the grass below.

"I remember," Alistair says, and she looks back to see the dreamy haze of memory on his face again. "I had this amulet with Andraste's holy symbol on it. The only thing I had of my mother's. I was so furious at being sent away, I tore it off and threw it at the wall and it shattered. Stupid, stupid thing to do. And then – the arl came by the monastery a few times to see how I was, but I was stubborn. I hated it there and blamed him for everything... and eventually he just stopped coming." He grimaces, so clearly regretful at losing both the amulet and the arl's goodwill that Marian feels a not entirely unwelcome wave of pity.

"I'm sure he forgave you," Marian says, moved to comfort. "You were young."

He laughs. "And raised by dogs. Or I may as well have been, the way I acted. But maybe all young bastards act like that, I don't know."

Marian turns to look out at the castle, shading her eyes with her hand. "You think the arl will help us?"

"I think so, yes." His voice drops, apprehensive. "This news we've heard about him being sick disturbs me, though."

"Me too," she confesses.

"I'm glad you know now," Alistair says. "Now we can move on, and I'll just pretend you still think I'm some... nobody who was too lucky to die with the rest of the Grey Wardens." There's a familiar note of sour jape there, poking fun at himself before someone else can get to it.

"Is that really what you think?" Marian asks.

"I suppose not," he admits with the smallest of smiles. "At least I'm not alone." He turns away then and walking a little down the path, sticks two fingers in his mouth, whistling for her errant mabari much louder than she'd managed with breath alone. Marian resolves to make him teach her that as soon as possible.


End file.
